Part 19: Ma Dukes is rolling with it...so, why can't you?

I'm chalk full of emotions, half-assed with hope, and tangled up in gorilla glue.

Thanks Sox.

I can't dwell on the game and I can't look too much into the fact that I did the following after turning the t.v. off halfway through the top of the eighth: shaved, put away laundry, opened mail, and wrote a to-do list of shit that needs to be tended to before I head out west.

Ah yes, heading back out Californey way. No air races this time- more soap box cars. San Fran and then on to Denver, a nice two-day siesta built in, in between leaving San Fran and heading to snowy Red Rocks for what should be the kind of big blow out most people see only once or twice a year. The kind of blow out that leads to head aches, hangovers, poorly-packed suitcases, and zero to absolutely no regrets.

Sam's email said there's already snow on the ground. I can't get excited about that like some of those Out West dudes like Tom Jim, GTI, or certainly not like the Burmese Python. But just running around Red Rocks for a few days, after running around the greater San Francisco area for a week, is something that does get me excited. These will be the last two Soap Box races we're doing after...shit- just got the final word on the game...is there always a tomorrow?...after a raucous and rowdy Philly soap box that ran smack into Hurricane Cuddle Princess, but no kind of storm strong enough to detour Eagles' chants, supreme drunken debauchery, and lots of good lookin' gals wandering up and down The Wall with that blissful look of a ravaged car wreck mixed with a lackadaisical Sunday morning brunch. Cincy was a much different scene and the hill lacked the built-in drama that The Wall provided. But the weather was killer and the people showed. They avoided the poison ivy for the most part, cheered when they were suppose too, and wrung those damn cowbells when called upon. We truly busted ass and hit the final buzzer after about 21 hours...more specifically at the point when none of us were totally sure how long we had just worked.

A long goddamn time.

But not long enough to stop us from throwing a few back with local folk after. And Cincy people are generally nice people and the area we were in, Mt Adams, had the snow globe feel that makes you feel sublimely just right- soft music played on Main Street as we loaded out the F.O.R.B. area. It all didn't seem real until the music was interrupted by football news...

It was Sunday. We really hadn't slept since Thursday.

40,000 people didn't seem to mind, so we'll bypass any haggling over technicalities, legalities, and any other related miseries.

It happened.

It happened just like the Sox game just happened- a good amount of build up followed by three tense hours of watching people other than you have a damn good time.

I love fall.

I love the Red Sox.

I love my folks.

Yet tonight, I really only love my folks. Those other two bastards are on notice.

I'm looking at you Papi.

Part 16: Mother Nature's gun shoots bursts of confusion only.

Callie, my parents' dog, was sprayed by a skunk. The stank filled up the house for days and all I heard about was how said stank wouldn't go away, no matter what kind of cleaning product my parents threw at it.

It's everywhere, Mom said.

But after a few days, I wondered if maybe she was making it up.

Then my bike was stolen. It was stolen from our locked backyard. In my head, some spider monkey Crack Head scaled the walls, ab ling them to get in the backyard and swipe my bike- the same bike that had recently been pimped out by Crazy Ray and the same bike that I was using day after day, riding to work or up and down the river. The bike was stolen. I found out the day after I got back from New York. I was up there for the Sox/Yankees game at Yankees Stadium- one of the last games between the two at the Stadium. I walked a few blocks to hitch a free ride back to Philly and despite the headache, felt pretty good about things.

But then my bike was stolen.

The only thing I felt good about was that I didn't punch the brick wall.

That's good, Chris said.

I know, I said. A few months ago I would have beaten the shit outta that wall.

It would have beaten the shit out of you.

True.

But what can you do? If it weren't for reality crashing down on the good times, we'd be insane, living in sunlight all the time and living large and in charge because nothing could stop us. No, all of the shit Mother Nature threw at us Saturday wouldn't be there and Soap Box Philly would have been more like Soap Box Provey last year- a beautiful fall day as opposed to the goddamn shit show that went down this year. The rains were intense- weather I hadn't seen since the boat days and shit if I weren't strapped, rocking my Grundens to protect me from the elements. I guess it was nice knowing that I can still tie a bowlin in pouring rain.

I'll take that one to the bank with me.

If only banks took things like that or car loan people or the student loan people. Why can't personal accomplishments run as currency? No one has money, but everyone has stories of personal battles they've overcome. If we simply ditched money and instead, you could roll into Wawa and buy a few Gatorades with a story of the longest pee you ever took, down at Phish for the Millennium.

But that would be a perfect world, I guess.

And recent weeks have lead me to believe that this world, it's not perfect. It's chaotic and turbulent. It's a constant storm- with the lulls and the bursts of sunshine, followed by torrential rains and winds ripping around so hard they take the blue out of your eyes while your cruising up and down the Wall with a Gator full of Wingers and scrim and arches and generators and broken down Ninjas and whatever else needed to be totted around.

The Sox won, my bike got stolen. Soap Box was a success, Brady's out for the season. Up and down, up and down. If God planned it this way, he should have made us all immune to motion sickness.

But he didn't, did he?

Nothing is perfect.

Nothing.