a friend of mine was talking the other day about his Dodgers...and his concerns for next season. having only encountered this guy right after once again enduring YET ANOTHER game of ALCS failure...another collapse...another episode of hopes dashed against the jagged rocks of despair...i found myself unable to do much other than listen.

(rather...i occupied space nearby while he spoke.)

i theorize i was seemingly stunned. speculating. wondering...

since last weekend, i've subjected myself to 35 consecutive innings of loss. (yeah, there was that 1 inning of something close to my team actually playing well)...but aside from that: 35 innings of total shit. 35 innings of ARE YOU KIDDING? 35 innings of "playing chicken." and yet, somewhere around the 29th inning of epic failure...i realized we may not be playing chicken. we may not be playing anything. including baseball.

my friend hesitated for a moment in his incessant Dodger bitchfest over the divorce and judge and "what if (this)," and "what if (that)," just long enough for me to interject.

DUDE. HAVE YOU BEEN FOLLOWING MY STUPIDASS TEAM AT ALL?

he waved his hand in dismissal and said, "Dude. Jesus. Be glad your team made it."

as i walked away a short time later, i found myself literally speaking to myself aloud. "Be GLAD? Be glad we MADE IT? Why the hell would ANYONE want to deal with shit like this? Isn't it better to simply never make it to the post-season?"

and i mused on these thoughts.

ive mused for plenty of days recently. and not-so-recently. ive mused all season, and even prior to the season. the off-season...

is this normal? do normal people immerse themselves so much into something as remote and obscure as the game of baseball? do they continually check on the status and welfare of teams and players and prospects and...do they read history and spend hours on end in the winter watching documentaries on the remote and obsure game of baseball??

well, i don't care what normal people do.

not one damned bit.

this is how i'm wired. this is what i trip on. and that's that.

but i do sometimes envy normal people. like the cashier at the chevron, or my coworker, or even my Dodger friend (well, actually, no, i don't envy him)...but...somewhere on the planet are people completely oblivious to what today means. people who are seeing today as just some idle wednesday...lookin forward to this weekend and halloween and all that.

good for normal people.

they say freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.

i wonder if i presently embody that definition with regard to my yankees...

cause, somewhere aroung the 28th, 29th consecutive inning of SHIT yesterday a thought occurred to me: it's over. tomorrow is our last game, or next to the last game. we will not advance and it's time to let this year's team rest.

let it be.

i don't generally give up on any challenge...but i generally weigh possibilities and principles behind that to which i invest myself.

my investment now is open to freedom.

not gripping tightly to an impossible feat against all odds...cause, well, sometimes we get so caught up in the struggle that we forget why we started the fight. it is reasonable to contend...for the yankees to try...to make every effort to play to the best of their ability and so on and so forth and blah blah blah

but dude. all godamned season long we have had a rocky and inconsistent team. all godamned season long i have held breath after breath after breath only to have NO GODAMNED CLUE what we were doing or HOW we were doing it.

yeah...the record showed we were tops. we held the east and all that. but...how the HELL were we the BEST? cause, we were often: SHIT. and if WE were shit, AND the best...then youre telling me the rest of the league is WORSE THAN US?

THAT was hard to comprehend.

which brings us to san francisco and texas and the phillies and us.

and...i guess on paper and within the realm of the Championship Series and Division Title winners and wildcard and all that other crap: we're the final 4 best teams.

hardly.

as i say farewell to this 2010 season with an exhausted and grateful heart, i am reminded that every season ends...and every ending season is hard to face.

but what i really miss, already, is seeing my team play well.