Despite my better judgement, I allowed myself to get sucked into the game again last night. Another grueling contest that should never have gone fourteen eternal innings. The whole spectacle raises some metaphysical questions about the meaning of life, the existence of a supreme being and the reality of an afterlife.
I felt very sorry for the poor shmucks who paid big bucks to sit in the narrow seats freezing their collective asses off for more than 5 hours while their hometown heroes bobbled, stumbled and slid around the bases like a bunch of little leaguers.
While I was ensconced on a comfy sofa with a frosty Sierra Nevada, a perfectly grilled burger and of course with my trusty clicker within easy reach, the ticket holder in the stands had to settle for undrinkable coors lite beer for $3.50 a pop and marginally warm hot dogs at $5.00 and a long line at the rest room. They had to watch every tedious second of the "park experience" including the singing of God Bless America. I surfed around, catching fragments of the Cards vs Astros, the football game on ABC and Sienfeld reruns.
I think it is pretty clear that if there is a god, then he is a taunting bully. Faithful Boston fans are yanked helplessly back to New York like kittens chasing a string 2 of Red Sox wins in a row. In their hearts, they know how it is going to end, the way it always ends, but they can't help hoping. This is the nature of this earthly existence. Something wonderful will happen - tomorrow, if you believe! Then, just when you think it might happen, despite all of your pessimism and dark thoughts, that's when the hammer of defeat smacks you with a baseball bat. That is why I call it a Hellhole.
If there is an afterlife, and I am on some cloud looking at the re-runs of my life, I firmly believe that I will be pleased that I chose the option of not-being-there when it comes to professional sporting events. However, it begs the question of whether I used my time on Earth wisely in watching the game on TV, when I could have been doing something worthwhile - like, making fudge.
Gurus who specialize in Time Management remind us that Time is the supreme scarce resource. No matter how rich we are or how smart or sexy, we cannot ever get back so much as a single second of Time. Nearly everything else in our lives can be replaced - relationships, property, even critical body parts. But we never get to do yesterday over. Our lives are like spools of twine unravelling one second at a time. One day there will be no more twine. It behooves us to spend this day doing things that we wont regret.
So, anyway, who's watching the game tonight?
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