What to expect in this post
To see how disconnected from the culture I was in my 20s
How I experienced 96 minutes of joy today
My Second Chance at Being a Good Son
The Tail Wags the Dog
A bit on Emotional Intelligence (Yeah, that’s a bit of a surprise left hook. Well, not now that I have telegraphed it, but it would have been…)
Some Takeaways
The Set Up
It was late October, sometime in the mid-90s, and my girlfriend and I had just flagged down a cab to ride back from dinner at the newest hip dining spot in Boston. We hopped into the warmth of the cab, gave our address to the cabbie, and moved closer together to warm up. Just as we transition into our own quiet conversation in the backseat, the cabbie speaks up:
So, you gonna watch the game tonight? - Huh? I'm sorry. The game? Yeah, the game. You gonna watch tonight? - Sorry. Which game are you talking about? The World Series! - Oh, does that start tonight? I didn't know. No, it's game six! - Oh. Um... who's playing?
I don’t recall if he even answered me, and I wouldn’t blame him if he hadn’t. The point is, I haven’t been a sports fan since graduating high school. It just wasn’t my thing. At that point, I was just another 20-something without a clue about what was happening outside of my little bubble. In my defense, it was a pleasant bubble.
Sure, I have teams. I am not an athletic ronin or anything like that. Born in the Seacoast New Hampshire region, I was a Boston/New England fan down to my marrow. However, while I enjoyed watching the Sox, Pats, and Celts with my Dad1, my interest just seemed to end there.
I graduated high school in ‘86, and after that, I only watched sporting events on TV when visiting someone or if it was on the TV at a bar. Like I said, it was just not my thing. Sure, I have been to many live games over the years, as anything live is always fun. Live MLB game? Sure, why not? Live Pro Wrestling? Hell yeah! All live sports are entertaining, except maybe golf. My dad tried but never sold me on that one. The only thing golf ever did for me was put me to sleep on weekend afternoons, and how many teenagers want to sleep on weekend afternoons?
Anyway, I went to some Red Sox games while living in Boston, a few Pats games over the years, and even some pro soccer and baseball here in Japan. However, you could not pay me to sit and watch sports on TV alone during that time. Olympics? Not interested. World Cup? Sure, if we meet in a bar. World Series? Japanese baseball? Lol, no thanks.
My 96 Minutes of Joy
While it may be Friday where you are, it is Saturday here, and I spent my day watching a double-header of time-shifted Celtics games. (Round 1 vs. the 76ers and Round 2 vs. the Raptors) That was my 96 minutes of pure joy. I was jumping out of the chair, clapping my hands, shouting encouragement to the players, and occasionally offering a “Nice play!” to opponents.
How did I switch from my default non-sport fan mode to a late-onset sports fan? Two things happened. The first was that my Dad got sick, and the second was that my son went to study abroad at Gonzaga University in Washington state.
A Second Chance at Being a Good Son
Early in 2018, my father needed to go through chemotherapy and radiation treatment for cancer but was facing difficulty due to his chronic back pain. Essentially, the back pain had become so bad he was unable to sleep in his bed and had succumbed to sleeping in his recliner. However, to get the radiation therapy, he would have to lay flat on an unpadded X-ray table. That would be a radiation therapy deal-breaker.
I was lucky enough to take time off from work, fly back to the USA from Japan, and spend the summer with him. I stayed with him and my stepmother in Florida, and each day, my Dad and I did two things: practiced getting him into a prone position on the bed to prepare for treatment and watched TV. The former was stressful, and the latter was terrific. However, we bonded a lot more through the former.
The timing of the meds, whether I held his shoulders or his hands, exactly when he pivoted his hips… Training each day was stressful and painful, but we figured it out together. The first day I brought him for his radiation treatment, and we were able to get him flat on the table, was a rewarding day.
The other part of our time, which was most of our time, was spent watching TV together. He recorded all the Red Sox games, Patriots, golf tournaments, Tampa Bay teams (MLB & NFL), and other games. If you live in the USA, you know commercials are hell back there, so we watched everything time-shifted and skipped through the commercials. I became a teenager watching sports with my Dad again. I loved it.
I was able to relive the experience of casually watching sports with him and appreciate it in a different way. It was wonderful.
The Hard Part
They say that one day, every parent will pick up or put down their child for the last time, but you never know when that will be. I knew it the last time I watched a baseball game with my Dad and the last time I watched a football game. When I flew home to Japan in 2018, I didn’t think I would see him alive again. I did in 2019, but the games we watched in 2018 were the last games we ever watched together. As sad as it was, knowing it made me appreciate them all the more.
Once I returned to Japan in 2018, I immediately signed up for a local sports streaming site, DAZN, which streamed MLB and the NFL. So, thanks to my Dad getting me back into watching sports, I now host an annual Super Bowl party for local expats, and I have a few friends who join me to watch games through the season. Baseball, on the other hand… who has that much free time? Those games take forever… not like ‘Cricket forever,’ but c’mon!
The Tail Wags the Dog
If you know anything about basketball, you know Gonzaga University is a big basketball school. As such, my son became a huge basketball fan while in the USA. He and some friends would go to the park and try to play pickup games, but as he had never played in Japan, he said he was hopeless. However, he still loved it.
He has been going on to me for a while about watching the NBA, but while I have jumped back into watching the NFL with both feet, as my visit with Dad was not during the NBA season, he did not have a chance to replant that seed. However, my son and I use the same phone provider, Rakuten, which includes a free NBA package. Score! My son convinced me to check it out, and now I am a hardcore Celtics fan again. Watching the Celtics play reminds me of sitting on the sofa or the floor in my father’s bedroom 30 years ago, cheering on Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, Robert Parrish, Dany Ainge, and crew.
Recently, while watching the Celtics, I find myself wishing I had a last chance to watch them play one last time with my Dad, as he loved the Celtics. I do recall his joy when watching Larry Bird’s magic on the court, and one of my favorite photos of my Dad is one of him in his Larry Bird cooking apron. I can’t watch the Celtics without thinking of him, and I wouldn’t have it another way.
With my son arriving back in town from university in just four days, I have been scheduling our NFL and NBA “games to watch together.” I am sure there will be a bit of the Harry Chapin curse2, and we will not be able to view them all together, but I can’t wait to sit and cheer on the Celtics with him.
Why I Took Notice of This Joy (The Left Hook)
Hi, my name is Steve, and I suffer from Depression, Anxiety, and stuff.
These days, I have been doing a lot of soul-searching, reading, and studying to find a way to stabilize myself. One of the more exciting books I have read recently is Permission to Feel by Dr. Marc Brackett. Dr. Brackett is involved with the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence (YCEI) and is getting Emotional Intelligence taught in schools through the RULER program.
While I have read the book and took copious notes in the margins, I will not offer a review, but I will say it is worth reading. Part of the RULER Program is the YCEI Mood Meter. It is a way of charting your moods based on your levels of pleasantness and energy. The easiest way to do this is to use the free How We Feel app3 they have created.
I have been trying to use the app recently to monitor my emotions to get a better idea of patterns and cues. However, the difficulty is when I am feeling down, I tend to ignore the prompts to check in, and when I am happy, my phone is set aside. Watching the Celtics play just happens to exist in the perfect juxtaposition of Joy and smartphone access.
That said, I am trying to be more consistent. After all, Socrates, when choosing death over exile, apparently said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” If he can face death with such a powerful statement, I should be able to push through a bit of depression to collect data. One would hope. At least this one does. YMMV
The Takeaways
A call back to The Hard Part: picking up or putting down a child for the last time. With Thanksgiving coming up, treat it like it is the last time you will be with each family member. I hope it will not be, but if you treat it that way, just in case, you do not lose a thing.4 😉
Questions
How would you rate your Emotional Intelligence?
Where did you learn it? School? Home?
Are you interested in improving it? If so, what is stopping you?
Note to my spellcheck and readers… I know this does not need to be capitalized, but I choose to do so anyway. So there.
This is really lovely. I'm not a sports fan, per se, but I do enjoy when people connect through sports. My dad was a huge sports fan, and I always enjoyed watching with him, or hearing about him watching with his brother and nephews :) I like the way you wrap up with questions! My emotional intelligence is, I think, pretty high. I didn't learn the term until fairly recently, but I've had my own journey with its elements. My mom definitely had strong mood & behavior disorders, significant enough that she couldn't hold a job. Nothing was ever diagnosed, but by the time I was a young adult, I had some things I really wanted to do differently. I was doing a lot of self-assessing for my own moods and behaviors, seeking out better coping mechanisms. I also wanted to get better at noticing others, responding to their cues, thinking of them first. I wanted to be a nicer person, a better person, and to form more healthy relationships with others - in the hopes that I could also have a more healthy family of my own one day! It's something I continue to work on, as a regular practice, and talk to my 3 teens about as well, so they can get an earlier start on it than me. Two of them have strong emotions like I do, while one has naturally milder emotions, and it's interesting for us all to notice and discuss the way that makes certain things easier or harder. Anyway, great prompts, looking forward to following more of your journey! I write Moments, photography + stories about moments of connection in nature & everyday life, if you like that sort of thing! :)
What a heartfelt journey, Steve. The impact of shared moments, even those centered around sports, on our emotional well-being is profound and deep. Wishing you continued moments of joy and connection with your loved ones.