She's Gone

Shocking, body rocking waves of tears flood over me. Do I really sound like that? It's been one day, not even quite.  She's still real, but she's gone.  Her smell is still here.  I want to love on her, she's not there.  The impulse is real, it's physical, I can feel it in my arms, the sensation of grabbing her skin, rubbing her neck, I can still feel it on my hands, but she's not there.  I know she's gone, but I don't, because I turn the corner to see her, expecting her to be there, but she's gone.  I make some coffee and think, I guess I should feed Bella now, but she's not there to eat.  Her homemade food is still in the refrigerator.  Goddamn she's become so fussy about eating late in life.  Wait, she was fussy.  Now she's gone.  I don't need to heat up the food.  There's no dog to eat it.  I sit down at the counter and try to do something normal.  I read ESPN. Suddenly I think, I'm sure Bella wants to go out now, it's about time.  Every morning for the  last 14 years. I turn, she's not there.  She's gone.  Her leash is right over there, but she's not.  She's gone. Forever.  I can see her hills out my window.  She loved those hills.  See that one?  She frenzied every time we got to the top.  It only took  a small glance and she knew.  Butt high in the air, staring at me, waiting for me to move.  The smallest gesture and she's off, I can't touch her, she's too fast.  She's laughing at me, now I'm laughing.  Left.  Right. Low to the ground.  How long can she do this?  I'm back in my kitchen.  She's still gone.  We won't be doing that anymore.  No more getting chased by cows.  No more rolling in shit.  God that made me mad.  And it made me laugh.  Hey Nikki, check out Bella, she rolled in shit again.  Get her outside now.  Now she frenzies again.  Baths make dogs do that.  They all do that.  Around the table.  Rolling crazily on the floor.  She's laughing at me, I can't catch her.  I'd love to give her another bath.  But she's gone.  There's her blanket in the laundry room, her hair all over it.  I pick it up, it still smells like her.  Corn chips.  All dogs smell like corn chips, especially their feet.  I can feel her feet in my hands.  But she's gone.  But she's here, I can see her hair.  I can smell her.  But she's gone. I can't reconcile the difference.  More body rocking waves of tears.  Splitting headache.  I think I just drooled during that wave.  Uncontrollable waves of grief.  Life goes on.  But it doesn't, not today anyway.  I'm in between worlds.  She's here and she's gone.  I pull out the old photos.  There she is as a puppy.  4 months old with fully grown legs, completely out of proportion.  Running, chasing, laughing with the other dogs.  Now she's gone. The dogs link us to the start of our married life.  The others have been gone for awhile and I've reconciled that.  Today, though, Bella's gone and it's confusing.  She's here and she's gone.  I go upstairs.  She was never here, her hips too tired to make it up the stairs.  Refuge for my mind.  I work a little.  Small relief.  I haven't heard Bella go out the dog door this morning.  Oh yeah, she's gone.  She won't do that anymore.  I want so badly to walk downstairs and love on her a little bit. But I can't.  She's gone. I've been through this before.  Time heals all wounds, right?  Maybe.  I don't know.  Not today, though.  She's gone.  I want to see her.  Today.  But she's gone.  It will get better.  But not today.  She's gone.

Power tools

"Is that the first power tool you've ever bought?" Brian asked when I told him about the drill.

"No, smart-ass, when I broke the one you lent me 10 years ago, I bought a new one to replace it, remember?"  I had him on a technicality.  I wouldn't be the first American male to never purchase a power tool until age 43.

"Yeah, well your new drill should have an asterisk by it because it's the first one you ever bought for yourself."

Whatever, let's not quibble here.  Whether it's the first or the second, the point remains that I don't buy or own many power tools.  In fact, I only have two:  A drill and a racket stringer.  There is some controversy as to whether the latter is a power tool, but here are the facts:  It plugs into the wall and it has a mechanical wheel that rotates and stretches racket strings.  I'm sure if you got your finger caught in there it would hurt a little bit.  I believe that qualifies as a power tool.

The tool wall of shame

Don't get me wrong about tools in general, I have several.  I keep them around in large part due to the fact that other males occasionally walk through my garage.  I have to maintain appearances. The tools hang on a wall of shame in the garage where they linger about, largely unused for long stretches of time.  I have doubles of many of them, a result of borrowing them from somebody else and never returning them (I kept Brian's backup drill for 4 years).   Alternatively, I often go out and buy a duplicate copy of a tool because I can't find the one I own.  When you go four years in between needing wire cutters, why would you assume you have some already, or bother to look for them in the jumbled chaos of the garage? If you see something of yours on that pegboard, let me know and I'll return it as soon as possible. The pegboard you see is organized only because we just moved into a new place.  Give it three months and I won't know where any of those items are.  The next time you see a photo of it, there will be 3 wire cutters hanging there.

Naturally, the first thing I did after buying the power drill was to photograph it.  I didn't see a new shed,  kitchen cabinets, or wine rack in my head when I got it.  No, I saw a photograph waiting to happen.  The lines, colors, and textures are what caught my eye, not its inherit value as a tool.  I think it's pissed at its fate because I can see it sitting there mocking me.

In a matter of 3 days, I've crushed its soul. Something this manly doesn't like to be patronized.  It sits there boasting of its "skil" and 18 velorameters (velocitometers?) of power, knowing it is too much tool for me, the baby skinned suburbanite.  It stands in proud defiance of its fate, a hermetic life of hanging out with the mere mortals of tools,  near the wall of shame, which it drilled holes for, in relative darkness, with intermittent bouts of hole drilling for hanging pictures.  I have asked it to make its own grave, and it knows it.  It also knows the next time you see a photo of the wall of shame and the surrounding space, there will be two of them.  I think a blue one will look good next to the red one in a photographic diptych.

Power Tool?

Chasing The Dream....

Had I been blessed with professional level talent in any sport, I surely would have chased the dream until that well went completely dry.  If I had managed to bullshit myself just enough to believe professional sports could be a reality, I would have been off on that likely fruitless chase.

I knew, though.  I observed the guys around me in college (in various sports), and I knew I didn't have "it".  I was competitive enough to eek out a job as a role player for an NCAA tournament soccer team and that's as high as my dream ever went.  I can't complain about that.  I got to play competitive sports for four more years than most people and I got the chance to play against guys that eventually became professionals.  Plus, I think I may be the only USAFA soccer player to ever receive a red card in the NCAA tournament.  That's something! (I was in a poor defensive position and got beat badly and had to pull the guy down from behind since we were already losing)

There are thousands of athletes every year, though, that have the ability to play at the next level and so they pursue it, spurred on by unlikely tales of mere mortals becoming gods like Tom Brady, a sixth round draft choice and now 3 time Super Bowl Champion.  Some of these guys are highly regarded, and some aren't, but they pursue the dream either way, which means they will toil in the minor leagues and/or obscurity for as long as it takes to make it happen.  These are the athletes that fascinate me.

I had the chance to observe these type of guys over the weekend at the Napa Valley Challenger ATP tennis tournament.  For comparison, think of it in the same way as AA baseball.  There were maybe 200 people there to watch and the players stay with "host" families.  They enter these tournaments to gain ATP "points" so they can increase their overall ranking in the hopes of getting into major tournaments and/or getting a better draw at the major tournaments.  I got to see 4 different guys play singles matches and here's my scientific breakdown of their overall chances of success on the Tour.

1. Sam Querrey - 26 years old, turned pro in 2006 and has $5,462,000 in career earnings

He is the no brainer in the group and is already well established.  With his game he has a legitimate shot at winning a major, the gold standard for a tennis player. He really shouldn't even be playing this type of event.  He grew up in Santa Rosa, though, and apparently didn't want to go to Asia to play tournaments this winter.  Instead, he'll be bullying lesser pros for the next 4 weeks in the Northern California challenger circuit.  He has a gigantic serve and follows it up with a big, nasty forehand.  No one here was even close.  He simply issued swift ass kickings to the guy on the other side of the net.  His winning amount?  $7,200 and a bottle of wine. Now he has $5,469,200!

This is what fascinates me about the whole mindset.  If you know you're going to get your ass kicked by Sam Querrey for the next four weeks and you'll never win a major because there are 50 guys currently better than Querrey and you're not good enough, what keeps you motivated to keep playing? The money?  Check the guys below for more information.

Querrey unloading on a forehand.

2. Jared Donaldson - Age 17.  Turned Pro August 2014. $81,477 career earnings.

This I understand.  The dude is 17 and is just starting out so it makes sense for him to play the challengers.  Plus, he made $81,000 in his first 6 weeks, that's not too bad.  It looks like he has some serious game and in fact made it into the U.S. Open draw in August, where he lost in straight sets.  I'm jumping on this bandwagon right now.

With these crazy arm angles, I don't understand how more tennis players don't require Tommy John surgery.  This motion is the same as throwing curveballs all day long.

Big game.  Unloading on a forehand.

Check out the compression on this ball.  Shot of the weekend.

3. Tim Smyczek - Age 26, Turned Pro 26, $639,000 career earnings.

This is where it starts to get dicey.  His career earnings break down to $79,875 per year.  That's not bad, right?  Now we have to factor in travel, and paying a coach, and training, and whatever else.  Now  I'm guessing we're down to about $3,425 in income per year.  Couple that with the fact that he's simply not good enough to win a major and you really have to ask why?  He's an effort guy.  He chases down a lot of balls, only to have them rammed down his throat on the next shot by the bigger, stronger, harder hitting Sam Querrey.  Yet, he's a top 100 player.  Out of the billions of humans on this earth, only 99 people can play this game better than he can.  And yet, he's so far removed from winning a major.  I suppose it's enough to keep you going to be able to say that you were the top 100 in anything in this world.  At this point, though, I recommend he pursue being a lawyer as indicated on his bio.

Tim chasing a ball down.

Here he is chasing down another one.

Got his racket on it.

Back in the corner, chasing down another bomb.

Alex Bolt Facing backwards as he chases down a ball.

4. Alex Bolt - Age 21, Turned Pro 2010, $112,000 career earnings

 The photo above is how this kid looked most of the day against Querrey.  Nothing about his game stands out.  He was little more than a sparring partner in this match.  He's not as fast as Smyczek and not anymore powerful.   His career earnings breakdown doesn't look good either.   I wonder how long he'll try to keep this dream alive?

Me and the fellas have already talked about it and we're going to see if we can get him signed up for our beer league.  Nobody will know the difference.