It is 6:40 AM on Sunday February 13th, 2022. I woke up around 4:50 and as usual spent the first 30 minutes in my phone looking at all my usual corners of the internet. I then put on my VR and meditated in the virtual perch overlooking a small glacial lake and range of Mt. Huntington. I then had to make a decision to drink coffee not. I’m really enjoying my caffeine and wine break as I think it had done a lot to improve my mental state. But today I decided to go with coffee and the enhanced buzz it brings after a long absence.
At this hour the world is starting to wake up. I see my neighbor go out her front door searching for that morning paper. The neighbor who is renting that I mentioned yesterday has taken his car out of the garage and is now driving the opposite way he did at the same time yesterday. I wonder if he knows I’m here as all he needs to do is look across the street and up and he would see me. But the world is still a little too dark to determine if he has glanced my way. Even if he did any greeting would seem awkward and out of place. The day is still in its infancy and to call out would be seem like disturbing a peaceful sleeping baby with unnecessary noise. No, at this time only the few birds singing their songs are welcome. Unfortunately for me I cannot immerse myself completely in the morning sounds as I have a fish tank filter that continually hums along providing a clean and thus life sustaining environment for my aquatic family.
I really enjoy the morning birdsong as it reminds me of my high school years working maintenance on a golf course. We had to report to the maintenance barn around 4:30 AM and it seemed only me and the robins were the only ones awake in the entire world. The robins sang loudly as though they wished to wake everyone with their excitement and enthusiasm for a new day. Perhaps we should take a lesson from the robins as they seem to understand that each new day is a gift, one more day to be alive! A scene from the movie City of Angels suddenly appears in my mind. The angels would gather on the beach at every sunrise and it was then that God would speak to them not in words but simply through the glory of a sunrise.
Today is an important cultural day in the United States as it is Super Bowl Sunday. Americans love to talk about sports as along with religion and now politics it often forms part of their identity. I could never understand why so many people were so fanatical about their support for what seems to be children’s games played by adults. Then I heard a great explanation by Andy Geiger who was the athletic director at the Ohio State University in the late ’90s. It all has to do with supporting your village and in medieval times that usually focused around your lord and knight. Well in the USA we didn’t have this long standing tradition so we rallied around our cities and universities and focused on their champions. The knights and village jousts or going further back, gladiators were replaced with men playing with balls! (snicker, snicker)
I no longer watch sports and think the amount of prestige societies give to these games is ridiculous. A society values certain traits and abilities but aren’t they all rather arbitrary? The most popular sports in the USA are all putting a ball where it needs to go. Now imagine we switched football for hopscotch. Everyone admired the best hopscotch players, their sculpted legs which enabled them to hop better than all the rest. Eventually hopscotch went from chalk drawings on a sidewalk to major stadiums full of thousands of people waving their hopscotch flags and wearing their hopscotch team uniforms. That my friends, is how I see the sports we venerate today. Come Monday the work call will be all about how excited my teammates were and how much screaming they did at their TV as the hopscotch participant hopped his way from the number 1 to 7. And the suspense, wow, many didn’t think he would make it past the number 3!! Boy was it exciting when the stone landed on a 6 instead of a two!
Wait, my apologies, I momentarily slipped back into an alternate universe where hopscotch reigns supreme. I meant to speak about the grown men running around trying to get their ball to a certain part of the field. Sometimes they will run it, sometimes they will throw it. And sometimes the other team may take it when that wasn’t supposed to happen! Oh No!!!
Sometimes I feel all alone as the fanatics are numerous, loud and boisterous bunch. Their overexcitement takes over and they forget about global warming, a democracy in peril, dangerous geopolitical movement, hyper-inflation, injustice and a small chance of thermonuclear war in the next twenty years. Did Smith throw the ball well? Did the stripped feline beat the big horned mammal?
Give them bread and circuses and they will never revolt.
Juvenal
Give them bread and circuses and they will never revolt, unless they are selfish Canadian truckers or acolytes of the great orange grifter
Mateo de Colón
My friend Brandon always holds a major Super Bowl party with his friends where they break out hundred dollar bottles of wine and get fabulously drunk. I have always been invited but usually only made a quick appearance to say hello (and sample the wine). This year no invitation came so it seems he has given up on me. The other member of our inner circle, Peter, usually reaches out as well to see what the plans are but no word from Peter either. Perhaps I am now being ostracized from the fanatical alpha-male group they turn into during major sporting events, like a werewolf on a full moon? Looking at my journal I spent the last Super Bowl at Peter’s house, lost the bet and insisted I pay my friend Brandon $50 in Dogecoin. That Ɖ250 turned into $600 at one point so one would think I should have received at least an invite if money were a concern!
Today my friends will slowly (or quickly) intoxicate themselves while yelling at the TV thinking their instructions to the players actually make a difference. Perhaps I would have liked to receive an invite but honestly I didn’t even think about it until I started writing this post. I imagine Brandon is with his buddies and Peter may or may not be joining as he doesn’t mesh well with one of Brandon’s friends. I suppose I cannot be too sad as I would have declined anyway. I have an exciting day planned already!
We have wanted to get to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk for a while and had a epiphany during breakfast yesterday. My wife mentioned we should go in a few weeks, maybe even spending the night in Santa Cruz. Then the idea suddenly appeared in my mind like a ray of light! Why not go during the Super Bowl? Everyone will be home watching the game so it won’t be as crowded! Also, we’re currently in a warm streak so the weather is perfect. Thus it was decided; we’re going today and I plan on uploading a few pictures to this post later on.
Well, I have achieved a potent coffee buzz. The day has fully arrived and any lingering influence of the night has been obliterated by the strengthening sun and a cacophony of birdsong and car engines. My neighbor has long since returned from his morning errand and my household is alive with electronic entertainment.
Addendum
Having drank three cups of coffee I’m not only incredibly buzzed but also had to pee. It was during this micturition that a wonderful idea occurred to me. I will wear my Doge t-shirt that Brandon gifted me when he saw Ɖ250 go from $.04 when given to $0.69 at the time of Elon’s appearance on SNL. I’ll take a picture of myself with that t-shirt prominently displayed at Santa Cruz and send to him. It will serve as a reminder of Super Bowl passed and a not so subtle complaint that I received no invitation this year! But as for me, no matter: I much prefer to ride the Viking Ship with my boys at an uncrowded Beach Boardwalk than intoxicate myself while watching a game I’m not a participant in. I will however miss the commercials, especially the crypto commercials that are expected.
