“Everything Hits At Once, What We Needs Is Just What We Wants” -Spoon“I am walking to a bar to watch a Kansas City Royals playoff game.” Is a sentence that I never thought I would type. Much less be a thing that actually happen in actual life. But there I was walking to a bar to watch the Royals play baseball in the playoffs. If you are reading this (and bless your sweet heart if you are) and need context, the last time the Royals played a playoff game I was 1. I am 30 now and I have just started my first, what I would describe as “grown up job” and I had also complete the first manuscript of my novel I had been working on for two years AND, lastly all i can say is “chicks man” and sigh. The last two months had been a lot. I would say the last 2 months of my life had been more eventful that the first 29 years or so. The last two months the Royals have been winning and it has been absolute madness, much ink has been used writing about how it has happened and what it has meant, but when my life has seemed overwhelming the Royals had decided to start winning.The last 29 years of Royals history has been losing and not even in a fun or frustrating Mizzou sort of way, just plainly being shitty at baseball. I always enjoy the Royals even when they are losing, because that is what love is. BUT these last two months?They have been something else.Its a bit hyperbolic to say that not much changed for 29 years and then over the last few months both my life and the Royals had started to mean something more, but I can’t for the life of me come up with a real argument against it. My therapist, and no I don’t think people should be ashamed to say the two words “their therapist” in the public sphere, in fact, I just completed a book about just that issue, but that’s this whole other story. Anyway, he recently told me, “I think you are doing great, you are just now experiencing the full spectrum of human emotion and that can be-” IT CAN BE FUCKING NUTS. Your foot ever fall asleep and then have to walk it off? You feel each nerve cell come back to life and the whole thing feels like your body licked a battery and you laugh because it hurts? Well, I have been doing that recently, but with every fiber of my being. I cried during a goddamn phone commercial two weeks ago. Let me emphasize, this is not a bad thing, I just think life is fucking miraculous now. Therapy is fucking awesome, ya know, once you are done with it.That is a really long way of saying that my emotional state yesterday was, well, interesting would be an interesting word to use. I met some friends at a bar, it is a Kansas City bar in the middle of Manhattan. There are 70 Royals fans in it and we all have huge eyes before the game, like deer staring into unknown playoff game dump truck headlights. None of us really know how to make conversation about this game because we all love the Royals, a choice that makes no sense, we will continue to love the Royals even if they lose, another choice that makes no sense, and we are about to watch a 4 hour baseball game in which the result will have no real affect on our lives, the outcome of this baseball game will not defeat ISIS or cure any disease, but we are all gonna watch because we believe in something AND THAT does not make any sense. But I have discovered a simple truth in life, matters of the heart are not supposed to make any sense; because life doesn’t. Love is a reminder of how little we know of this reality. Love is simply a hint from the universe whispering for us to choose to believe in something. I have chosen to believe in The Kansas City Royals for the better part of my life, this has caused tremendous sadness, but every once in a while it doesn’t. And holy shit. It’s why I am writing this and hopefully why you are reading it.The Royals give up a 2 run homer in what feels like approximately 6 seconds into the game. If you haven't noticed I tend to stencil the circumstances from seemingly unrelated things together in hopes of explaining life. For a while I thought this made me irrational and the slightest bit moronic. Turns out I am just a dumb artist. But when Brandon Moss’ first homer flied into the stands- I yelled really loud, drank my beer and thought, “what does this say about life?” Which, I understand seems ridiculous to those who have not met me. When the Royals came back to take a 3 - 2 lead I thought it again and then when The Oakland Athletics SCORED 5 GODFORSAKEN RUNS in one inning to take a 4 run lead I asked myself the same damn question.“What does this arbitrary game of men playing ball mean about our existence?” At that moment I sat on the curb next to my former boss and dear friend Sonny Patel and thought this thought. "Maybe some things are just sad forever. Maybe I should just accept that."My best buddy Logan has a term for when I drink too much and embrace nihilism. “Don't go Dark tonight Dirk.” he would say to me.I’m about to go dark, I feel it in the pit of my stomach. “Goddamnit Sonny, why did I even write this stupid fucking book no one is ever gonna read it! Why did I take this job I am an actor for christ sake IM NOT SUPPOSED TO BE WEARING KHAKIS TO WORK! Fuck this movie business and girls and rent and paychecks! What are we doing here man, it’s just a fucking game, why do we even believe in games? It’s just a game? This whole month has been one god forsaken dumpster fire. You can care all you want but no one gives a fucking shit man.Why did we even ever leave the mid-west? Fuck this month man. WHY DID I QUIT SMOKING? WHY AM I GOING TO THE GYM? Why are we even talking about this….”Earlier in the day my friend Conner said, "Look at it this way, at least if you guys lose the game you will have a perfectly good excuse to mope around." He was only half joking. And him saying that is really all I can think about in that moment for some reason.Sonny is quiet. He’s from Iowa.“Sorry, that was…” I mumble nothing to no one in particular. Sonny looks at me and in the most matter-a-fact way possible says to me. “Dirk. The game is not over.”I mumble something about the A’s bullpen and the river Styx. I suppose he has a bit of a point. I walk back into the bar and the Royals burn through 6 more outs and I enter one of those strange moments in my life that I can count on my left hand where I don’t have anything to say.“WE ARE GONNA BE FINE” My friend Rory says. “No we are not.” I reply after a long silence. Rory looks at me and say, “You need to believe more often Dirk.” The Royals begin to steal all the bases. Stealing bases is risky, but the Royals can’t hit home runs so they have to pinch run and steal bases like crazy. I am in a bar stool miserable as hell. Everyone I know has been texting me all day. No one, for good reason, should speak to me in this moment and my phone has gone silent. There are As fans, that I can only assume were personally hired by the Marquis de la Sade, laughing in the corner. My book sits unpublished back on my hard drive at home. Somewhere I am sure there are couples falling in love blissfully unaware of this fucking game, and though they only hypothetically exist, they are annoying the fucking shit out of me right now.Then we got a run.Then we got two runs.We just keep stealing bases and I find myself believing again. I believe we can win and I know now that if we lose, it’s gonna hurt So. Much. Fucking. Worse.It is the bottom of the 9th and I am out of beer so Sonny is buying it for me as he is now fully invested in a game he didn’t know would turn into, as the Royals tie it in the bottom of the 9th, one of the most beautiful and painful displays of agony and ecstasy I have ever seen in a sporting event. We strand a runner on third, the game stands tied. We don’t really have many pitchers left so we put in some rookie. “Some rookie” happens to be a player I saw pitch with my friend Brian at Yankee Stadium at the beginning of this stupid month. I said he probably sucks. I was drunk. I was also wrong. Brandon Finnegan pitches through extra innings in a fashion that does not break my heart until we replace him with what has to be our last pitcher, because we are surely now playing baseball in a Russian Novel and not Kauffman stadium. Our last reliever gives up a run to a former Royals player because my life is a farce and what the hell is going on.Then in the bottom of the twelfth inning we give up an easy out and we are down to two and I accept deep in my heart that maybe this is just the way life is and that hope is just this thing that causes heart break in the end and that I should just do it less often as to not feel so bad. The Royals have lost baseball games for 29 years and I have been experiencing quite a few of them with a pretty grim view on the future for myself and the team I chose. Then Eric Hosmer hits a triple. Then we get him home and tie it up and then my favorite baseball player since his first game, possibly the most beloved athlete of my life, whom had been playing like absolute shit all evening walked up to the plate. Salvador Perez is my favorite player and it’s not even close. Salvador Perez plays baseball like he is 8. He gives everyone hugs on what seems like a constant basis. I love him. Salvador Perez hits the ball down the left field line and I begin to run around a bar screaming and hugging strangers. The Royals won. I am not sure how it all happened. I don’t know what to think. I stand outside and yell to the deserted streets of New York City.I call my father. “Wow.” He say. “Holy shit dad.” My voice begins to tremble as my eyes well up. “You know there is a lesson here.” “yeah?” “Don’t ever fucking give up.”I walk home and call friends and family and everyone is crying and yelling and smiling. I sit on a train and think about everything all at once and I smile so hard I think I might hurt myself. I get home and sit on my couch, open a beer and watch the last inning again and cry.I really never thought this would happen. This month and this day have taught me one valuable lesson, in the decision between hope and nihilism always choose hope. Hope will break your fucking heart but if you don’t believe, you wont have one to break. via /r/baseball http://www.reddit.com/r/baseball/comments/2i3a96/i_wrote_about_the_royals_and_crying_it_would_mean/
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