New Year's Day
The first day of the year began rather somberly with all my telephones turned off in defense of my siser-in-law's threat to call me during the ball drop. I'd spent all Saturday afternoon doing a laundry and the better part of the evening bingeing episodes of "Heroes" (Season Three) and wasn't in a chatty old-person's frame of mind, especially when everyone knows that the first "visitor" of the New Year has to be a guy if it is to mean good luck.
I lucked out on finding a tv screen tuned to the Patriots game at Applebee's, but, not before traipsing down to the Hampton Inn only to find that they finally got wise to how empty the place is most of the time and would only open their bar "after 5:00", well after kick-off time.
Be that as it may, there was an attentive waiter at Applebee's who didn't mind doing his job (as far as I could tell, I was his only customer) and, as a result, I had a decent afternoon eating a juicy hamburger and sipping a tall glass of Stella. I felt less like Maurice Chevalier and little more like Louis C.K., but, that's all right. I decided I'd settle for that.
In-between punt returns, I was able to give some thought to the nature of work, how some people hate their jobs no matter how well compensated they are and oppositely, how some lucky few fall into work that suits them just fine even though it just barely covers the rent. I think it's obvious that your relationship to your job colors everything, including how much attention you have for friendships.
Pale Male and Germboy may complain about how much they work, but, essentially, they're doing stuff that is well-suited for them and they seem to have tons of friends with whom they find the time to be in contact. And, if ever there was a man with a seamless membrane between work and relationships, it would be Bing. He always answers e-mails, is devoted to the men of his church and goes out of his way to find ways to spend time with them.
And, then there are people, like Anthony, and to a certain extent, like Tiger, who feel the crush of G-d's edict that Adam and his progeny forever till the earth for their bread (I'm paraphrasing, but, it's something like that) and everything else just feels like an added weight on their shoulders. People fall in love with them only to find out there's room for only one other loving type of relationship in their lives, the person people they undress in front of. G and generally speaking, that's not a lot of people.
I lucked out on finding a tv screen tuned to the Patriots game at Applebee's, but, not before traipsing down to the Hampton Inn only to find that they finally got wise to how empty the place is most of the time and would only open their bar "after 5:00", well after kick-off time.
Be that as it may, there was an attentive waiter at Applebee's who didn't mind doing his job (as far as I could tell, I was his only customer) and, as a result, I had a decent afternoon eating a juicy hamburger and sipping a tall glass of Stella. I felt less like Maurice Chevalier and little more like Louis C.K., but, that's all right. I decided I'd settle for that.
In-between punt returns, I was able to give some thought to the nature of work, how some people hate their jobs no matter how well compensated they are and oppositely, how some lucky few fall into work that suits them just fine even though it just barely covers the rent. I think it's obvious that your relationship to your job colors everything, including how much attention you have for friendships.
Pale Male and Germboy may complain about how much they work, but, essentially, they're doing stuff that is well-suited for them and they seem to have tons of friends with whom they find the time to be in contact. And, if ever there was a man with a seamless membrane between work and relationships, it would be Bing. He always answers e-mails, is devoted to the men of his church and goes out of his way to find ways to spend time with them.
And, then there are people, like Anthony, and to a certain extent, like Tiger, who feel the crush of G-d's edict that Adam and his progeny forever till the earth for their bread (I'm paraphrasing, but, it's something like that) and everything else just feels like an added weight on their shoulders. People fall in love with them only to find out there's room for only one other loving type of relationship in their lives, the person people they undress in front of. G and generally speaking, that's not a lot of people.