Life is Good

It was a chilly well heated night in Carmel. An eclectic group was assembled to celebrate the wedding of Obana and Jessie. And at my semi circle table, was a mix of people with varying familiarity. But one gentleman (I call him Belcher), was smiling and talking with me, being complimentary about some of the original sports focused writing I started back in the day. He was a new add to the distribution list, and even with limited interactions in the past, a positive force.

Writing for me has usually been a spontaneous desire. I may force a Sunday night Facebook status because I feel like I “owe” it to whatever declining audience is out there, and traditions are an important part of this journey. NFL on Thanksgiving. Christmas Eve dinners. High school movie dates (people do / did that right?). And it’s a common theme that I’ve talked about with my family and others, but positivity and good things get limited social and written commentary. It was already becoming muted, but post 2020 - forget about it (in that cowboy Italian I’m all that voice).

But no no, not today folks. Today we’re writing about it. Today we’re gonna talk about it. Because you can feel it out there. In you. See it out there.

I made hats for this wedding in February of 2020. They were customized bucket hats for the bride and groom and others who won whatever raffle was happening in my hippocampus that evening. They didn’t fit the new theme. But they were delivered in October of 2021, 20 months later. Quoting a guy I love (from that Friday night), we went bookend to bookend. We’ve gone bookend to bookend.

Yes, I know you can argue and poke holes in that metaphorical expression, but just don’t. Believe in it. We can get the calendars back on track. We can hang out again. We can travel again. We can go to events again. We can be idiots again. We can share each other drinks again. We can live again.

Departing LaGuardia tonight, you could see it - there are more lights on in New York City skyscrapers. There are more languages being spoken from international tourists perusing the streets. You can’t get a reservation at a good restaurant again. People are complaining about non covid things. People are getting sick with non covid things. Like me.

Not necessarily a sickness, but I developed a nice stye the morning of the wedding, so was of course making jokes about it at semi circle table, while Belcher, Sweeney and I among others just had a grand ol time. Talking Wisco, Warriors, NBA over under pools, stye treatment, work hierarchy bull shit, et cetera.

And sometime after that, when Belcher and I were sidebarring, that’s when he told me. Tringali, you gotta write something. Just call it something simple and true.

Life is good.