Playing for Time

These are strange times, so strange that every day brings something we haven’t had to deal with in quite this way before.

I’ve been thinking about the “feel-goods” we latch onto when life turns tentative, like when a horse named Seabiscuit raised the spirits of the whole nation by winning against all odds.

Reading and writing are always my first means of escape, but I’m gung-ho about the sportsing, too. I’m awkward, I have no depth perception, and no athletic abilities whatsoever, so I sign up to clap and cheer because I genuinely love most all of it. It’s soothing to watch the fluidity of trained athletes using their bodies to full effect, smoothly doing the things I can’t, winning and losing battles that aren’t life and death but feel somehow meaningful.

PGA tournaments are wonderful for watching and sometimes napping, but there’s also major league baseball, college basketball, and professional tennis, my favs. I have a love/hate relationship with boxing and football, both of them damaging but also full of spectacle, ability, and sheer bravado. I’m not sufficiently motivated to figure out how soccer, rugby, and their cousins work, so I tend to space those off. Ice hockey is sanctioned brutality, and bowling on TV is out of the question – I’ve never been that bored, no offense to bowlers. Olympic years are like dessert, the best saved for last.

What’s your preferred method of escape? I’m always looking for new ways to win at life, and running away from it is how I relax. 😇