Friday 10/2/21
It's depressing just burning this shit here, man.
From a letter today: "You know what this is like? It's like you're whipping these precise, tight spiral rockets down the field, and your receivers, the people you need to catch the ball and run with it into the end zone, are mucus-coated slugs and sea cucumbers. Who are often bigots. Like, what do you expect to happen? They don't have hands. Legs. Bones. A spine. A brain. Much in the way of the power of movement. That's what I'm typically trying to work with. Idiots and bigots. Who are usually both. Seriously almost wrote Luke Neima at Granta and said, 'What do I need to do here? Do some rapes and some plagiarism like Tao Lin, and be an awful writer like Lin, then I can go in? Is that what you're looking for? Waiting for me to do some rapes? Should I check my calendar for next weekend, see if I can rape the f--- out of some people? Then I'll be desirable?' These are the worst humans who have ever lived."
Anyway. Great op-ed I wrote this AM. Best thing one will read on this whole Brady and Belichick tilt. Not that that matters fuck all, though. Ain't about that. The Beatles quote is not true, by the way. But it sounds nice at the end of Abbey Road.
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Why you shouldn't care as much about Brady vs. Belichick this weekend as you probably do.
I am a guy who has spent almost half of his life having watched Tom Brady and Bill Belichick win at historically unprecedented levels in sports. I grew up in the town next to Foxborough where the Patriots play. My late father was a season ticket holder in the years when no one wanted anything to do with the Patriots. And all I can think, with the hype of this week, and Brady’s big return as a Tampa Bay Buccaneer, is that there might be something off in your thinking about life, if you truly believe this is a mega-story.
That Brady left when he left is about the most normal thing in the world to me. I don’t see any drama there. What I see is reality. Life. Take a Lennon and McCartney. How long did they write songs together for? 1957 to 1963, really. So one year, as commercially successful artists. If that.
Brady and Belichick had a creative partnership, with a two decade run. What I always want to ask the people who go on and on about what is perhaps the most hyped regular season game in NFL regular season history, is how long did you want them to stay at it together? Did you want twenty-five years? Thirty? Do you not understand calendars?
You work in close proximity with someone, in a demanding job, a highly competitive arena, eyeball to eyeball, and eventually it ends. That’s how the whole living thing works. And if you don’t get that that’s natural, and can be vital, then I am worried about what you can and can’t get.
Here are some items that I know. Both teams need this game. If the Patriots lose, they are done, their season is over. You cannot start 0-3 at home and make the playoffs in the NFL. I’d be shocked if it’s ever happened. Had Brady stayed in New England, he wouldn’t have won another Super Bowl. He’d have been fine, with decent numbers, but the energy, the magic mix, had left that particular corner of New England. You would have had another couple years out of him, a Wild Card round loss, and then see ya, Tommy.
A fresh challenge is awesome. It puts new blood in our system. If we are built to be a winner. I don’t think you’re built to be a winner if you’re honestly caught up in the “drama” that just isn’t here.
In some ways, what is happening is so ordinary, so relatable. We all have reunions like this in our lives. Maybe it’s your ex at the cookout. Brady sought that challenge. Football fans were then treated to dynamic levels of play they might not have been.
I’ll watch the guy until his last play. I admire people who seek challenges. And I’ll hope he gets his brains beat in by my team this Sunday night.
But there is power in a goodbye, and life is a series of passages, so that we might have new arrivals. I’d say you’re pretty sedentary in the important ways of living, if you don’t see this game for what it is. Shouldn’t be this raging topic in your brain up until kick-off. Should be a “yeah, I get it,” type of deal.
Let it be that, and then let’s watch how it plays out on the field, and hope for the best Brady/Patriots game we’ve seen yet, only with a different arrangement.
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