Sporty Spice

To the untrained eye, my summer has been an exercise given to me on how to get past shit. The assortment of conflicts that stuck onto me is still dizzying, and I'm still trying to keep my head on straight, but in so many ways, it's been a blessing. I feel really strong without feeling powerful, which is good for me, and I want to let whoever reads this know that my life is solid and I'm trying to open up channels for resolution and acceptance. I still need other peoples' willingness to work with me, but otherwise the table is set.

In a cruel twist, the summer's wounds and scabs have been the most visible signs of my season. However, right through the endless trail of fights with my friends and my girlfriend and my brother and my mom and my dad and everyone who was important to me, there was a non-sarcastically important revelation in my life-- sports, and my faith in sports, can carry me through... anything...?

The results are clear: I teared up while watching sports that my eyes never dreamed of tearing up about- golf, tennis, gymnastics, swimming, exhibition football games, sports commercials, even fucking ceremonies that just were about sports. I actually participated in fantasy soccer for a few weeks. Reading offseason football rumors filled up vast portions of my day. I started again to peek into bars from the street to check the score of the game. And I liked the Celtics for a few minutes.

Those are tangible moments of my ridiculous sports secret life. To follow sports like this was never expected of me, not even from me. I knew I liked them, I just never knew I needed them. And so friends came and left. Between work and sleep, I fought off my sadness, and willed things to get better. And I watched Wimbledon. And when Nadal won, I cried. Not for anyone else but me, for being witness to spontaneous greatness. And when I found myself pulling for Rocco Mediate to upset Tiger in the U.S. Open, I stared in awe. I cared about golf. Tiger won, and I felt it inside again. He won the 18 hole playoff on one knee and it felt like I could do it. Accomplishment was everything. And so between Garnett's euphoria, Crosby vs Zetterberg, Turkey's Euro miracles, Manny Pacquiao winning his fight, Tiger's arthroscopic knee surgery, the best tennis player ever being dethroned in the best tennis match ever, Brett Favre, China making everything insane, and the rising prospect of the 08-09 college football season, along with the always present blanket of the Mets kind of winning, I realized the overwhelming presence of accomplishment in the world, and in a way, sports and its stunning victories and failures were my fuel to ignite my transformation from weak to strong Paolo all in one season. And sports gave me love and faith in people, which is why this summer was the best summer of my life.

Stay strong.

I'll call you in a few.

this

As far as Phelps, I'm more of a Gold Medal #2 kind of guy.

There are six things that completely amazed me so far...



1. How this made anything possible














2. How Jason Lezak realized he was swimming for so much more than this













3. How beauty overcame strength just this once for Nastia Liukin











4. How Liu Xiang knew that he had to at least try this














5. How Usian Bolt was able to look around before this was over











6. How this answered everything












If you haven't seen all of these, you should. Then again, you probably did.

Butterfly

I came back home just now after a few days in Pennsylvania without TV or the Internet. I'm taking my first few steps getting back in the rhythm of knowing about the rest of the world, outside of my dad and my brother. So for now, I'm freezing up on reading your full-length latest facebook message, because all I can really inhale is Michael Phelps and Nastia Liukin. Brett Favre also debuts tomorrow so I might have to wait for that to happen until I can muster up enough energy to get a response for your message. I truly am putting a lot of energy into this. So you know. I have written dozens of entries into my journal already since I started feeling strange-- all of them aimed at figuring out exactly how I felt about you and what I should do about it. So my mind has been as clear as it can be, and pretty open, and very active. So you know that I don't just watch sports and work all day without you crossing my mind. You cross my mind sometimes more than I can take. And there's a way that I want to relate everything about you to Michael Phelps, but I just can't figure out exactly how to. It exists though. Maybe somehow in that you/he's so good at the fly but not as good in the freestyle. I don't even know if that's true anymore though.

The robot

Hey Jojo, as proof that you change my life, I started a similar blog for my other best friend Harrison Magee, who is in Argentina, and I wrote him the following message. I was too weary to write a whole new entry, but this one is like something that I would write to you any way. You change my life because I never feel close to my friend Harrison, but now that I'm doing this, I do, since I know that he reads it even if he doesn't respond. Don't worry about me running out of original blog material to write you about. I got more. I hope your thesis is well and fresh mozzarella.


"It's sad but I just tried to claim the url "aboutfacebook.blogspot.com" because I wanted to start a blog about Facebook, or at least claim the name as I mulled over whether a blog like that would be a gay thing to do. Fortunately, it was taken already.

How much do you think the Personal Info section matters? I try too hard. But then, I get a compliment from someone who I think is cool (and who probably has a cool Personal Info section too), and then I start thinking that maybe it's worth it. It's my modern-day equal to coming up with new Livejournal interests, which I excitedly memorized until I could get home to type them in. I know that someday this will all embarrass me. This blog especially.

I'm trying out to be Mike tomorrow. Thanks for the Super Mario advice. It actually helped a lot, because I realized that I could research tips on how to be any mascot in the country, not just tips on how to be Mike. I found a bunch of good mascot fights/danceoffs on Youtube. And then I found a 12-part video on how to do the robot. I then found myself peering back constantly to make sure Danielle didn't wake up and see me standing in only underwear at 3 a.m. trying to emulate this gay guy doing the robot.

I've never had such a nerve-wracking audition before. I am trying to think of mental tricks to help me at this audition, and so far "imagine the judges in their underwear" is on it. That and "pretend you're gay." I also have to remember to do the Vanilla Ice dance before anyone else does it. Can you help me come up with more? I'm trying to think of which of our friends would make the best mascot, and maybe trying to emulate them a little bit.

Thanks for listening boo. I don't think you need to start a new blog. You already have that other one that isn't on your profile anymore. You're better off having an amazing time in B.A. and creating lasting memories."

It ended with a chair

I hope your thesis is well and your concert was swell.

Have you seen Juno? It seems so Garden State/Urban Outfitters to have it as one of my favorites. Like something that I feel is golden, but 16-year-old girls love it. But it's one of my favorites.

My other favorites are Requiem for a Dream, Waking Life, Before Sunrise, Party Monster, Friday Night Lights, Lost in Translation, Adaptation, Zoolander, Face Off, Little Miss Sunshine, and Wedding Crashers. What are yours?

I still don't feel like I know a lot about you, or that you know a lot about me. But really, I'm totally okay with it. It makes sense.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WzmQmz9Kdc