A little sadder, a little wiser.

A year ago, I wrote this comment on Spencer Hall's always excellent, always exquisite college football season opener. 

A year later, a little sadder, a little wiser: College football makes you part of something bigger than yourself, and that is what makes it so dangerous. It makes fools of us mortals here, the idea of belonging, the idea of defending something so meaningfully meaningless, it makes you willing to step outside your normal bounds of human rationality.

We are the one who believe in miracles, you know. We name our plays after prayers, we speak even jokingly in fears and suppositions, we marry logic and the unseen and we balance this on the backs of young men, the backs of children who we do not know. We come here to our temples built of stone and steel and concrete and we yell out our supplications to the wind.

We have come to no Christian end, we were always there, we will always be there and we know this – yet we come back year after year, hoping that something in this, something in this family balances out the bad, that the money that we raise for good, that the life-extending joy we get, that this…thing is worth it.

Sometimes we’re brought back down to earth, and it hurts so much and reminds us that we are human (or it doesn’t and maybe for a second we think about what happened to us that we got here). Are we ourselves, or are we this thing we’ve given to ourselves, given ourselves (and our dollars and our time) to?
Is this thing worth it?

I don’t know if it is. I don’t know if it isn’t.

"Sorry"

I just wish he'd say "sorry."

It's great that Baylor's hired a top law firm (and two very good, experienced lawyers) to investigate how the university handled the tragedy that I'm going to refer to as The Event, as I am tired of typing it out. It's great that students still feel safe and comfortable on Baylor's verdant campus, and it's great that the football team has moved on and is ready to play their first game.

There's just the little fact that a control-F of the two press releases on The Event (both conveniently buried at the bottom of Baylor's homepage, past the fluff about move-in and summer activities) reveals no "sorry" and no "apologize/apology."

Oh, I know. The hope is that the aforementioned investigation clears the university of all wrong-doing, and there's hope that there won't be a civil suit, and I get all of that but how can you not see that someone did something wrong, and therefore an apology is demanded. Not only to the victim, but to the alumni base who has stood by this university in times of trial before.

Stand up and say you're sorry.

We require it of our toddlers - say sorry! And mean it! We preach on it in chapel - the true meaning of Christianity is forgiveness, and humility. We require it of students who feud with their roommates! Why, now, is it so impossible for you to stand up and say it?

We're sorry.

We're sorry that such a deed happened in our hallowed halls, on our beloved campus. We're sorry that our inaction hurt not only someone who should have been protected above all else, but that it hurt the thousands of alumni that we love to ask for money. We're sorry that even if we had no idea that we were bringing this onto our campus, we did not react in a way to the crime that would leave us without the need to say "sorry."

We're sorry that this former student-athlete fell through the cracks of personal responsibility. We're sorry that we somehow overlooked something, somewhere. Mainly, we're sorry that we failed - because we did fail, and we need to not fail again.

Just say it. I promise no one will think the lesser of you for it.

In Good Faith

The university whose ring I wear on my right hand, whose diploma I hang on my wall, whose hat can be seen in many pictures, had a student-athlete, football player Sam Ukwuachu, convicted today of a 2013 sexual assault of a former Baylor student-athlete, Jane Doe.

This case came to light a few days ago, when rumors of why exactly Ukwuachu had been "soft-spended" from the football team following his transfer from Boise State started coming to light. Today, Texas Monthly ran a story on the background of this case, as well as the university and athletic department's responses to the case at the local (campus) level.

These responses, if Texas Monthly's reporting is true, are unacceptable.

But after the school’s investigation (so insufficient, according to the court, that the judge sustained a motion from the prosecution to restrict the defense from referencing it during the trial), Baylor took no action to discipline Ukwuachu, even while charges were still pending. From Baylor’s brief investigation, to its failure to consider disciplinary action, to its defensive coordinator’s statements this summer about the player’s expected return, the school’s idea of how to respond to serious rape allegations is seriously out of step with that of the courts.

How can I in good conscience throw my support behind a university that seemingly cared not about someone who so direly needed care?

One of Baylor Football's favorite things to tout is how this is a university (and an athletic program) of second chances. That forgiveness and help are Christian values, and how a good environment and support from strong coaches can change someone's life. These are admirable traits, taken at face value, and there have been proven success stories from this program.

In the shadow of second chances, however, can be found the possibility for deep shame. When does a second chance become an excuse to keep a talented player, rather than an attempt to help a human being?

When does athletics trump the human mission of the school...and when does the "Christian" mission of the school create problems when dealing with crimes of a sexual nature?

It keeps coming back to this: What if Jane Doe had been me? How can I feel comfortable in recommending my friends, the young women I know and love, go to a university that has shown what appears to be only a passing interest in treating potential victims of horrible crimes with respect?

I went to Baylor. I love Baylor, the institution, the professors I had, the education I received, the traditions I passed down, the family I gained. I also understand Baylor - and what the good and the bad of the religious mission can be.

However: Even if you, in your misguided ivory towers, think that a young woman (or man) who is reporting an assault of a sexual nature somehow "sinned" in the crime committed against them - even if you don't believe their tale until it is proven in court - even though "innocent until proven guilty" is the technical law of the land - how can you in any good faith force a victim, even an alleged one, to share classes, to share rooms, with the accused? How can you put that burden on them - that they must bend themselves and their injured selves to your will, when they are hurting - is not the Christian mission one of healing?

There should not be a cherry-picking of forgiveness away from aiding those who are hurting.

I know that there is more still to be seen in this case - but by being silent, statements are said.

Tightropes

I long for the safe spotlight - holding an audience in the palm of my hand, anonymously. I would have killed for solos in college, for that brief moment when I got to step outside of the group and prove myself, but only for a second, a brief minute, before being absorbed back into the warm comfort of a larger group. 

Wind ensembles (and orchestras) hold both some of my best and worst memories. Competition is what kept me in music, and what drew me to sports, and what keeps you alive can also kill you. I'm seven years removed from my first All-State selection, and the pride I have in that accomplishment still sits hot in my chest some days, both warming me and warning me. 

I'm older now, obviously. I'm not "the best band director in the state of Texas," as a journal from my senior year of high school amusingly posits for my future. I've lived through mental breakdown, instrumental burnout, pain and sorrow and also joy. I graduated with a very expensive degree with a major that doesn't exist outside of that narrow world of music. I've played flute maybe ten time since I graduated. It doesn't mean that music doesn't still live inside me. 

These days, the most use I get out of my degree is putting together playlists and judging the hell out of anthem singers. 

I miss performing, especially on days when the mundane world is a little to close (and then I want to slap myself, because how artsy-pretentious is that, the "mundane world," if I were my own editor I'd cut that in a hot second.) I miss the way that music gets inside the bones, can create life from ink and paper. Most of all, I miss that precipice, being balanced on that point where you're both inside and outside, selfishly wringing the music for your own meaning while trying to let the audience have theirs. 

It's hard to get this back to sports, particularly now that I've stopped typing this to conduct music at my desk multiple times. Where does it connect? That competitiveness - everyone working both together and for themselves. You thought really great music came together through pure collaboration? No more than a good team is made of up truly selfless individuals. That's the dirty side of both music and sports - to be the best, you have to be a degree of selfish. 

It's that balancing point I was talking about - that's where the best happens. You walk the tightrope, multiple tightropes, and sometimes you fall off. Sometimes you get back on the same rope. Sometimes you find a new one. 

Sometimes you end up sitting ten stories up listening to yourself from seven years ago and wondering where this tightrope goes. 

Rambling on about shoes and the meaning thereof.

Got some new shoes today, technically for my birthday last week. 

I have to be honest, I’m not sure how I feel about them, and that’s a problem. Not just because they were a very wonderful thoughtful gift, but because it’s a symptom. 

I’m constantly having to adjudicate myself, address myself, and consider the way I’m presenting myself when I’m at the park. We’re not just talking issues of professionalism. I work for a Fortune 500 company in real life. I know professional. But I have to be so careful that I’m not giving off an air of “I’m just here for the boys.” or that’s all I’ll be judged on. 

Heck, it’s all I’ve been judged on, sometimes. 

But that I’m sitting here thinking “I can’t wear my new baseball-themed flats to a game because of what it might say about me in the minds of outside observers…”

I’m not sure how I feel about that. 

No Words

I've got no words.

I'm three pieces behind, and yet all I have mental energy for is sitting on my bed watching hours and hours of hockey. I can't even begin to write this without feeling a kind of anxiety and frustration that is fairly nameless, my words eaten up in the blackness of my brain.

It's fucking baseball. (I don't normally curse on here.) It's not like I'm over here crafting the greatest speeches the world has ever seen. It's baseball. It's a piece on MLB and social media; a piece on the Texas Rangers minor leagues; a piece on Jurickson Profar. It's nothing earth-shattering, nothing mind boggling, nothing that should be causing me this much pain and heartache.

Writing is who I am, though, and if I cannot write, I am a failure.

I've beaten this particular drum before, attempted to exorcise my demons through written word, forcing myself to put fingers to keyboard despite my complete numbness towards creation.

It's extremely easy not to try, as I wrote earlier this week, plagiarizing myself in my utter lack of creativity. It's easy to curl up in a ball of non-being, losing myself in stupid tweets about hockey and an utter indifference towards my responsibilities.

Though, who would want me to write right now? My words are insipid and uninspired, my ideas flabby as my body, and I delete far more than I can. I've had so much coffee, and yet I still feel exhausted. Nothing works.

I've got no words.

On baseball, burnout, and the lure of giving up.

We all know the sporting cliches, the words and phrases supposed to pull from us the very last ounces of reserve. Give until you have no more, then find that last bit and give again, yes?

That sentiment is true other places than sports, as I’m sure everyone would agree. We see it in the workplace, we see it in school, we see it in life itself. The only problem with this is: When do you stop? When is okay to not juice the last few dregs of your soul, of your mind, of your heart into what you’re doing? When is it okay to look back and take a break?

Or can you ever?

Baseball is as big a part of my life as some people’s significant others surely are. Now, I don’t say that in a cheeky “baseball is my boyfriend!” kind of way, because that’s not who I am. For me, it’s just an immutable fact, like “my eyes are green” or “my wrists are screwed up.” Baseball is a part of my being, which is why being at a place where it’s hard to write about it, even harder to work up any real and true passion for it hurts.

I’ve been burned out before. In some ways, I still am: I played flute for eleven years, making it my major and my life, and walked away after I graduated. It’s now been almost a year and a half since I walked across that stage, and I’ve been able to play flute with a real sense of peace maybe four times in these last few months. It’s hard to have to be perfect.

I don’t mean that in some kind of self-indulgent way. I’m well aware that “perfection isn’t a destination, but a journey,” but that journey is what’s killing me. It’s nearly impossible to be good, much less great, at everything, but what else less is worth anything? If I’m not close to the best at this writing, at my “real job,” at everything but the parts of life that don’t leave physical evidence, then what am I?

Of course, it's really easy to contemplate the easy way out. If you can't be the best at anything, then why try? Just float along in a sea of mediocrity, never trying to be good, because failure only happens when you try. 

That's where I am right now, to be quite honest. At the intersection of doubt, exhaustion, and frustration, knowing what I don't know but not having time or energy to learn it. 

I may not write very much this year, and it kills me inside to realize that. Because what am I, if not a writer?