On Lulu

 Let's start with 2 truths and a lie.  

1. In general, people agree that you should not have a favorite child or pet. To quote my mom, "Of course I love all of you boys equally."  We tried to hide our skepticism growing up when she said that.

2. My dog Lucy, who endured pretty terrible abuse before my wife and I rescued her, has the dearest ambition of both catching varmints, and eating as many treats as she can during the day. We feel that she deserves as many treats as she wants. 

3. Until Lucy came along, I felt terrible guilt for almost 10 years about my beloved black lab Rosie (3rd picture, on the right) and how I yelled at her on her last day with us.  Lucy helped my heart heal a good bit from that. 

I lied. All three of those statements are true

I don't know how you feel about reincarnation, or life being cyclical, or that maybe sometimes God sends us messages when we least expect it. Rosie was a great dog, like all dogs are, and she along with her brother suffered  abuse before my family rescued the two of them when I was 9 years old. Rosie and Bo were fixtures in our lives for 10 years, until one night Rosie and Bo escaped from my Mom's yard, and got separated.  Rosie came home, but the next morning, we couldn't find Bo.  Rosie was in too much pain to walk and when I left the house that morning, I scolded her for running off.  We still hadn't found Bo, and I was upset.  I didn't know it, but that was the last thing I ever said to sweet Rosie. My mom put her down that morning to keep her from being in pain any longer.

Miraculously, we found Bo that afternoon, and he spent another year with my family before he got sick with cancer and passed away. Even with the bonus time we got with Bo, I carried guilt with me for years about Rosie.  All she had wanted was to run with her brother, and I scolded her in the last hours of her life for it.  Just the thought of her would bring such acute guilt that I would have to leave the room I was in, and there was many a night I laid awake hoping that I would have a chance to redeem myself for sweet Rosie. 

Like I said, I don't know how you feel about the cyclical nature of life, or God sending is signals, but I got what I believe was a signal loud and clear in November 2018.  

A friend of my girlfriend (now wife) told us about a dog that had been abused, and was now spending almost 24 hours a day kenneled in a house with 5 other dogs, and asked if we wanted to give her a better life.  I cannot recall what we talked about renaming this mysterious dog, but the second we met her and she jumped up into Tayler's truck, we knew that Lucy was going to stick around in our house. She immediately got along with our other GSD, and we realized that Lucy loved nothing more than getting some treats for being the best dog, even if all she was asked to do was lay on the floor. To this day, Lulu will not turn down a treat under any circumstances. 

At the same time as Lucy joined our household, I was going through some personal issues of my own, and I spent many a day laying on the couch with Lucy talking about the demons that I was battling. This sweet dog became a sort of sounding board for all of the things I could't say to another person, and I realized that Lucy might have been a quiet nudge that it was time to lose some of the guilt I had been dragging along for the better part of a decade.  Somehow, Lulu let me know that it was time to forgive myself of the guilt I felt about Rosie, and maybe forgive myself for letting Double IPAs and Jim Beam upend a career that had started off like a rocket and fizzled out like a wet sparkler on July 5th. 

The other day I was texting Tayler about our dogs, and she told me to quit sending pictures of Lucy since she was my favorite, and send pictures of our other two pups.  That's when it hit me that of course Lucy is my favorite.  She always will be, even though our other two dogs are sweet and goofy, and loving in the kind of way that only dogs can be.  Lucy is my favorite because she helped me through a time in my life when I could have chosen not to get a handle on drinking, and lost even more good things in my life than I already had.  Lucy told me that somehow, in a long ago time and place, Rosie didn't blame me for being upset at her, when my heart was aching for us to find her brother.  Lucy showed me that moving forward into the future is always the best, since it leads us away from 23 hour kennel stays and towards a bucket of treats that is never empty. Lucy showed me that healing is possible, and even probable, with time and love. 

Thats why she is my favorite. 

On Rain

 It wasn't Prince's Purple Rain. It wasn't Forest Gump's "little bitty stingin' rain." It wasn't even the kind of rain that the Temptations were wishing for. This was Andy Dufresne's rain when he gets out of Shawshank. It was Jim and Pam's rain from the Office. This was Van Morrison's rain from And it Stoned me. 

Van Morrison, And it Stoned me

Ever since I was a kid, rain almost brought along a feeling of an otherworldly cleansing when the clouds opened and rain drops started falling. That smell of summer after a rain shower, where the sunshine is brighter and the earth smells alive is one of the most distinctive smells that I can remember, and it takes me back to my childhood every time I experience it. Last week I was having one of those "blah" days. It was supremely unmemorable in every aspect, until I got caught in a rain shower that took me back to being 12 years old again, waiting for the rain to stop so my friends and I could go back to enjoying a glorious summer day. At that moment, I had a moment of supreme clarity that just shook me, and Van Morrison popped into my head. 

That rain washed away all of the things that lead into a forgettable, subpar kind of day. I was irritated and didn't know why, I had a hard time really enjoying any aspect of what was turning into a pretty mundane Wednesday. Until the rain started falling down. For whatever reason, that rain acted as a kind of reset button for me. The rain stopped, the sun came out, and I noticed how vibrant the leaves are this year. That earthy smell rose up from the woods, and I remembered the cool recipe I wanted to try for dinner that evening. A small little rainbow popped up, and I was thankful of the fact that I am healthy, have a job, and am more blessed than most, so maybe I should appreciate my life a little more often. 

Like I said, it was a Van Morrison kind of rain. Sometimes a little rain is exactly the thing to put things back into perspective. 

Maybe you'll get caught in that kind of rain soon.

Yours, RA 

7 irons and walks in the woods

 I just spent two hours and forty five minutes without uttering anything other than "Why in the world did you go that way," and I could not have had a better time doing it. 

I am one of the dewsweepers at my local country club, one of the guys who starts playing golf early in the morning and is done by the time most golfers are just getting ready to start their day. I had the 8:30 tee time this morning, first of the day, and I can honestly say that early morning walks through the woods with occasional moments of joy are good for my soul. I got to see the sun crest over Table Rock in Morganton this morning, got to lip out a birdie putt on the magnificent 15th hole at Mimosa Hills Golf Club, and enjoyed some delectable breaded flounder for lunch, all before 11:30 this morning.  There is something special about enjoying nature in almost complete silence, with all of the distractions of day to day life stripped away. My phone was on silent, my ear buds were off, and all I could hear was the wheels of my pushcart rolling through dewy grass; of course, occasional cracks of a clubhead hitting a ball followed by frustrated grunting broke the otherwise pristine silence. Yes, these early mornings spent in solitude at the golf course help keep my sanity intact. 

There is something soothing about playing golf in the early morning. With every stroke, you can see lines in the grass where the ball landed and rolled, get to hear the birds waking up and chirping as the sun peaks over the horizon, and every step is another step in the lifelong journey that comes with playing golf. No golfer has ever had the perfect round. Even Tiger Woods at the height of his powers would speak to the reporters after his final round 63 about the strokes he left out on the course. This morning was a perfect embodiment of golf for me. I have not been playing particularly well, I've been fighting a bit of a slice with my driver. But on the 18th hole this morning, I managed to string together 3 shots that keep even the worst of the duffers coming back for more every chance they have. I striped my driver right down the middle, and was left with a nice easy 7 iron into the hole, which leads back to the back porch of the clubhouse. This shot didn't mean much, I had played too poorly to break any personal milestones, so this was simply the last iron shot of the day for me. I struck it absolutely pure, and the club was ringing in my ears as I watched the ball take its gentle parabola from 165 yards out, and stopped 10 feet from the flagstick. 

Until this point, I had played 17 holes without saying a word. No "Come on!" or "Bite!" had crossed my lips. I stepped over my ball, and looked at the birdie putt that would make an excellent exclamation mark to my round. I though it was a bit of a left breaker, and I took my putter back with the utmost confidence that it would drop into the hole. As the ball rolled, I waited with baited breath, until at the last moment it careened to the right, which was the opposite direction I anticipated. Then, I finally spoke my first words of the morning, "Why in the world did you go that way?" 

I tapped in my par putt to conclude my round. 

This has been a crazy year for everyone. Life has been as far from normal as it can get, and yet we are all trying to get through each day with the same vigor and enthusiasm as we always have. You might not play golf. You may have never even been to play putt putt. But I assure you that setting time for yourself, with no distractions or complications, is good for the soul. You might not find the joy that I do in hitting a perfect 7 iron. But all of us need some respite from the hard times that 2020 has brought each and every one of us. Whether it is in a leather bound book, a manicured fairway, or in an artist's easel, we all need relief. I hope you find some, the same way that I found mine this morning. It does wonders for the soul. 

On Forever

In 365 days, I will be getting married. In the long list of things I have wanted to write, that sentence has got to be at the top of the list. I have spent the last 5 years doing a great job of messing things up in my life, but this is one thing that I have done right.

Tayler and I met how most of us millennial's meet our significant others, on a dating app. On our first date, she talked me into seeing a scary movie, which is not something I do on a regular basis. It turns out that A Quiet Place is actually a pretty good movie, and when I see it pop up on Hulu or Amazon Prime it always makes me smile, because it takes me back to that first date with the woman I am going to marry. Tayler and I have been on some amazing adventures together, from Caribbean cruises in the Bahamas to road trips to Kansas City, and every day is another day to spend with the person I can so clearly see my future with. We have been through ups and downs, same as with any other relationship, and over time I have seen us grow in ways that I thought was impossible for people in their late twenties. We have adopted a German Shepard puppy named Lucy, who has added to our household in a beautiful and crazy way. Even our grouchy GSD Oakley has decided that adopting Lucy was a great decision, even though it means less belly scratches for him during the day. Tayler has managed to make my family fall completely in love with her because of the things that I saw as soon as we met, which is her determination to achieve goals, compassion for others, and the way she brightens a room just by walking into it. In short, she has enriched my life in every way since the day we met, and I think standing here one year away from the big day, it was time to put down on paper what I have known in my heart for two years now.

I am beyond excited for Tayler and I to tie the knot and start our married life together. This next year is going to be crazy and will probably fly by, and I thought it was fitting to write this post now, sitting one year away from our wedding date. Here is to Tayler, the most incredible person I have ever met, and a person who has turned my life into everything I hoped it would become. I can't wait to see what the future holds for us.

This will be difficult

Today was the first New Years Day in a decade where I woke up without a hangover. This Christmas was the first one in years where I didn't have a beer. As of 30 minutes ago, I have not had a drink in 17 days, which is the longest span I have been sober since I enrolled in college 10 years ago.

This is a difficult post to write, a hard one to read, and I am on a journey that started out impossible and has worked it's way down to a daily struggle. Maybe it will get easier, but I doubt it.

It is easy to rationalize drinking in your early 20s. Every night has an excuse to go out and drink, and when you have a good job and a life that is on track with no ceilings in sight, drinking is just part of a bigger picture that looks pretty damn good, as long as you don't look real close at it. I spent years and years attempting to drink away self doubt and insecurities, but all I really managed to do was drink myself out of several relationships and out of the classroom where I was so happy teaching.

 Luckily, Miller Lite didn't stop me from landing on my feet, even though at that point it was readily apparent to everyone who knew me that I had a drinking problem. See, in your mid 20s, its not as acceptable to be hungover most mornings. People might not say anything, but every now and then you'll catch people giving you the side eye or talking about you to coworkers when you show up bleary eyed to work for the 11th day in a row. Family members also don't find it nearly as funny when you get so wasted you can't get yourself home, or pick a fight over something trivial because your drunk self just wanted to get mad at someone.

Now I am almost 28 years old, and I have found that living alone in a house full of empty beer bottles isn't a good indicator that you're husband material. In fact, women who love you really hate when they come home from a night shift to a trashcan full of cans and a boyfriend too hungover to let the dogs out. When the woman who loves you tells you it is going to be her, or the alcohol, it is finally time to do some self reflection. In the end, it was an easy choice to make. Every instance before, I had chosen the bottle. This time I finally decided to sack up, and give sober Ryan a chance.

My goal for now is to be sober for 90 days, but I can pretty much already tell that this is going to be an indefinite break from alcohol. Beer makes me a bad person, and I am too old with too much on the line to choose something as stupid as booze instead of being healthy. Everyday has been a struggle so far, and I think it always will be. I crave a beer when I am not thinking about being sober, and I have found myself guzzling soda like it is going out of business. But that is better than grabbing a beer. The road is hard, the journey is long, but it is worth it. I will be sober.

Hope is a good thing...

My favorite movie of all time is The Shawshank Redemption.  I can watch that movie every day of the week, and twice on Sunday, and never get tired of it. It is cast perfectly, it is based on a amazing short story, and Frank Darabont does a excellent job directing it. The seminal moment of the movie is when Andy Dufresne climbs through 800 yards of sewer line, "800 yards of shit smelling foulness" as Red puts it, to freedom and a new life in Zihuatanejo, Mexico. In all my time of loving this film, which is almost a decade of watching the movie, I have never truly related to Andy. Not until the last 6 months of my life.

The last 6 months have been tumultuous, to say the least. I am a man who prides himself on handling my own business, and dealing with issues, those that arise, in silence. I hate asking for help, especially from family. In the last 6 months I have lost my job, had a relationship end, lost a dog, and nearly lost my house. All of these things are consequences of my own actions, or inaction, and I am responsible for everything I have dealt with since March. In the process I have managed to alienate almost every member of my family who cares about me, due to pride and a unwillingness to admit mistakes. In short, I hit rock bottom.

Rock bottom for me was the day after a mountain weekend with my family where I fought with every single person present in the house at least twice, shrugged off responsibilities for my actions, and left on Sunday morning with the sourest of tastes in my mouth. Not the finest moment for Ryan Alexander. I was frustrated with where life had taken me, and didn't know what to do. I acted like a victim, instead of taking ownership of my own choices. I don't thing I have ever felt as low as I did the 3 hours it took to drive home from Highlands, back to Mooresville.

Andy Dufresne felt low. He almost broke when the warden had him spend a month in solitary. He almost broke under the torment of the Sisters. He almost broke when he found his wife cheating on him. But he persevered, through 27 years of confinement and solitude. At my lowest moment, I thought of Andy Dufresne. I could either resign myself to failure, or make do with what was in front of me. I chose to take the Andy route, and help myself to battle with the obstacles in front of me.

It has been difficult, starting over again. I have a new career, which I enjoy immensely. I managed to keep my house, and it feels like home for the first time in a while. I managed to patch things up with my family, and am working towards repairing the damage that I did this summer. I have forged a new relationship, and I remember what it feels like to share a part of yourself with someone else, to truly trust in another person for the good of the both of you. In short, I crawled my way to freedom. Andy was my inspiration.

Andy said to Red that  "Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things. And no good thing ever dies"
That quote helped get me through a tough time in my life. But I have managed to climb through 800 yards of shit smelling foulness, and come out clean on the other side. Me and Andy both managed that. Now I just have to make my way to my own version of Zihuatanejo, Mexico.

Closing Time

"Every new beginning comes from some other beginnings end."

As a child of the 90's, a song that I heard on the radio hundreds of times growing up was "Closing Time" by SemiSonic. The line above is one of the more memorable lines from that song, and until very recently, I did not have much life experience that let me relate to that particular quote. A few years ago, I began my teaching career, but that wasn't really the end of a chapter of my life. It was me setting out on something wholly new and unexpected. But not the end of something I had previously set out to do.

Well, today is the end of a chapter in my life, and the start of something new. I began my teaching career at South Iredell High School, and my first year teaching was an incredible whirlwind of learning what in the heck I was doing, getting to know my kids, and figuring out what I wanted to do with the rest of my adult life. In some past blog posts, I have talked about the incredible adventures I had my first year teaching, like the time I did a poetry lecture and the kids actually enjoyed it, to my students helping me grieve for my grandfather who passed away. I have enjoyed every second of my time at South Iredell, where I learned so much about my self, and my kids, and where in life I want to go. I've discovered that the moment a child understands something, where a concept or theme clicks in there head, is one of the most precious, inspiring sights that a person can see. I have seen children at their lowest points and tried to reassure them that their goals are still attainable, and I have congratulated kids when they have reached the zenith of what they set out to accomplish. While on this crazy road, I learned a great deal about myself as a man, and the impact I can have on a kid who is just setting out on a journey of their own.

Sometimes I question the impact I have on my students, until I go out on the weekends grocery shopping, or to Target for things around the house. Without fail, I see one of my kids, and almost without exception, they are excited to see me. They scurry up to me, and we talk about school and sports, and exciting plans for the weekend. With a "See ya Monday," they run off, and I am left with a feeling of happiness and gratitude. I am happy because my kids obviously have a connection with me; I am grateful because the kids let me know what I am doing right. It means the world to me that my students enjoy speaking to me, spending time with me. I teach them english, and a few life lessons, but we teach each other what it means to be humans. How to care for one another, how to seek out other perspectives, how to pick up others when they are feeling low. If I leave any impact on a student, I hope it can be one that tells a kids that doing the right thing, and being a good human being , is always worth it. They will never regret being kind to someone. Hopefully, that is my legacy.

My career at South Iredell High School is ending. I am not sure what the future holds, but I am certain is includes me standing in front of a whiteboard, with a Robert Frost poem behind me, as I explain the significance of nuclear war in regards to "Fire and Ice." Teaching is what I am meant to do, and South Iredell has given me tools and experience that I will cherish the rest of my life. The wonderful people I work with, and great students I have taught, have left me with a strong foundation. It has been a joy teaching the last three years, and every minute has been a positive one for me when I have been at school. This chapter of my life is ending, but something else is beginning. Hopefully, it can measure up to the first three years of my teaching career.

On broken hearts and classrooms

When my grandad Sam died, I didn't really know what to do with myself.

I had spent the whole day with my family, hoping against hope that he would pull through against the cancer that was burning through him. Me and my brothers sat around my mom's house that whole day, telling stories and remembering all of those moments that we might have taken for granted at the time. My mom came back from the hospital, and we popped in Mr. Hollands Opus, one of my moms favorite movies and the running theme of a blog post I wrote last year. As we all sat watching Mr. Holland fall in love with teaching and make a lasting impression on an entire generation of kids, I remember saying to my mom that the movie was a whole lot more impactful once you have stood in front of a group of kids, and tried to teach them something.

By the end of the film, when Mr. Holland gets to see his opus,  which was not his symphony after all but the children who he taught over the years, we were all crying. Not sad tears, it was those tears you get when you see a baby walk for the first time; the kind you get at the end of a truly perfect day.

A few minutes later we found out that Sam had passed away.

Until that moment, I  didn't know that a "broken heart" was a literal expression. For the next 24 hours I walked around in a haze. I wasn't ready to live in a world where the man who had taught me so many things,  a man who gave me a Libertarian Party membership card when I was 8 years old, wasn't going to be around to talk to anymore. I emailed my coordinator and coworkers to let them know what was going on, and made arrangements for the week in case I wasn't ready to go to work the next day.

As I trudged through that day, the longest Sunday of my life, the only thing that motivated me was my students, the kids who I teach every day. I truly love seeing them, talking to them, teaching them english and helping them get through the struggles that 16 and 17 year olds see as the end of the world. They don't know it, but they helped me get through one of the worst days of my life. I have gotten to know them well over the last 8 months and I am 100% honest when I say that I don't have to go teach every day, I get to go teach every day. I went in that Monday to school, and when the first student asked me why I looked upset I could barely hold it together. I told the girl that my grandfather had passed away over the weekend, and the look on her face told me that I made the right decision to come in to work that day. She cared and wanted to make sure I was ok, just like the rest of her classmates. The kids helped me heal, and for that I am ever grateful.
_________________________________________________________________________________

I made a good call when I became a teacher. I remember being 16 and saying I would never teach, but then again, how often are 16 year olds right about anything? I can see myself in a classroom for the rest of my working life, teaching kids the craft of writing and the ways to love literature. I am almost done with year 1 of a 30 year journey and I already know this: no matter what happens over the next 29 years, teaching has already put me in the positive. The classroom helped me mend my broken heart. For that I am ever grateful.

On Teaching

When I was in college, I read Stephen King's book On Writing, and it changed my life. I had just gotten into writing for my college newspaper, and reading this manifesto on the ways to go about writing, when to consider yourself an author, and generally analyzing the whole process of sitting down and pouring a little bit of yourself onto the page really stuck with me. After I read his book, I committed myself to the craft and really took off as a writer. I started to make money, and not just pocket change, by selling stories and articles whenever I could. I really felt like I was on my way to being the next Tom Sorenson, Joe Posnanski, or Jeff Pearlman.

Well folks, obviously things didn't end up like I intended. I got out of college with my sparkling diploma, and found that newspapers weren't hiring. Magazines weren't either. And making money freelance is hard to do, so sometimes you are eating steak and sometimes you are on the all ramen, all the time diet. I tried my hand at substitute teaching and really fell in love with it, I felt like I could be in a classroom for the rest of my life and be 100% happy with it.

About 6 months ago my journey to become a teacher started. I registered as a lateral entry teacher, signed up for the Praxis exams, and headed off on my way. As soon as my Praxis scores came through, I started applying for jobs. The first one I applied for gave me an interview, and I got offered a position at South Iredell High School the first week of July.

I just wrapped up my third week of teaching full time, and it has been a roller coaster ride. Every day is an adventure. I never know how my kids will react to what I have planned, if my lecture will generate an awesome discussion that goes right up to the bell, or if I will get nothing but dead eyes and vacant stares, and have to scramble to get through the whole period without resorting to the dreaded "find something productive to do" method. But in the midst of dealing with 60 rowdy 16 year olds on a daily basis, I had a moment that literally changed my life.

My second week of class I did a poetry analysis class period, to get my kids used to how I teach and figure out if my method was going to work with these students. I chose three poems that I am very familiar with and love: "Fire and Ice" by Robert Frost, "Invictus" by William Ernest Henley, and "Ozymandias" by Percy Blythe Shelley. I know these three poems backwards and forwards, I have them memorized and can talk about them all day if somebody will sit there and listen for that long a time period. I had the students talk about these poems with me, figure out the themes and similarities, and at the end of the period gave them homework where they needed to tie these three works together in some way. I just wanted to know if the kids had held onto some of what I had been saying for 90 minutes, to see if I was effective.

As class was ending, a young man walked by me and said "That was the first time in my life that poetry was interesting. Thanks for that Mr. A." I am not sure who was more shocked, me or him. I had hoped that my lesson would be effective, that the kids would have a little more insight into literature than they had before. I chalked it up as hyperbole, that he was saying something he maybe didn't mean, to impress me or something.

The moment that made me fall in love teaching, that almost made me cry, happened the next day. I was in my classroom during my lunch hour, when I get some work done and maybe 20 students sit in my room for social time. I sat back in my chair for a second to take my mind off of the papers I was grading, when a unfamiliar face started talking to me. This girl asks me, "Mr. Alexander, when I have you next month are we going to do the poetry thing. My friend said it was really cool, and I don't want to miss out on it." I am not sure how I held it together long enough to get to the faculty bathroom. Never in my life did I think that I would be a teacher. And here I sat in a classroom with my name on the door, having kids asking me if I could make sure to do the really cool activity that students had done the day before. The moment, when I realized I had reached my students, and taught them something that had them talking to their friends about it, hit me like a freight train. I knew then, without a shadow of a doubt, that I will teach for the rest of my working life. I had heard horror stories about first year teachers, and here I was being asked my a student to make sure I repeated my lecture on poetry of all things, because she didn't want to miss out on it. If that student only knew how much her question made me feel, how knowing that I gave my kids a lesson that they felt was good enough to talk with their friends about validated all of the work that went into that 90 minute lesson. Until that point, I hadn't seen the kids really connect with what I said. At that moment, it hit me that I can really make a difference with what I am doing.

I am about to start my fourth week of teaching this Monday. I've got lessons to plan, papers to grade, a sports team to help coach, and find some time to fit my personal life into all of that. But it is those moments when kids let you know that what you are doing is important, is meaningful, that what I am doing every day is having an impact, is what get's me through some of those long days.

I love what I do.
 I do not have to go to work every morning. I get to.
Nothing could make me happier.

Thanks to you, Dan Brown

I can thank Dan Brown and his solidly ok novel, Deception Point, for introducing me to the girl who I have been dating for the past three and a half years.

You see, I was at work lifeguarding a neighborhood pool I had been at for a couple of summers when a very pretty girl came by to tan and swim. I watched her sit down behind my sunglasses, hoping that she would not catch me staring, as I thought of a way to start a conversation. For a good 30 minutes I tried to think of a way to introduce myself without being creepy, and as the clock ticked down the minutes towards the adult swim when I would have to walk by her, I was nervously thinking of anything to say to this girl to not come across as a weirdo.

After 10 agonizing minutes in thought, I had to get up and take my adult swim break. I got off the stand with nothing, I was drawing dead as poker players say. Every step toward her chair was agony, until I saw that she was reading a book, and not just a regular book, but one I had read before. So as I am walking by, I blurt out "That is a good book you are reading," and then scampered away before this beautiful girl could reply. In my mind, I had done all I could. The ball was now in her court, so if she decided to talk to me, it was all up to her.

Following the break, I walked around the opposite end of the pool so that there would be no awkwardness, and got back in my stand to stare at the bottom of the pool for another hour. The next thing I know, pretty girl herself is jumping into the pool and heading my way. My lord, my line actually worked. Chalk that up as the worst pick up line of all time, but it worked. All of a sudden, I had just met my girlfriend, Cassie, and we have been together for three and a half years now.  I don't think anybody who could have seen my conversation starter would have known what they were looking at, the start of a long term relationship. And I can't blame them; after all, my friend Matt swears that I am "hitting way over my batting average" with Cassie.

After that first conversation, we had the what is supposed to be really awkward first date, but it went fabulously. Or it must have, because Cassie decided I was worth seeing again. Then, she passed the crucial test of meeting my two dogs, and it wasn't long until we were dating, ready to face the difficulty of a long distance college relationship.

I am writing this because I can't help but think of how extraordinarily bad my opening line was. Every time we tell the story of how we met to people, they laugh at how awful I was at starting the conversation. My college buddies used to do a creepily accurate impersonation of me walking by and blurting out "Thats a good book you are reading" to hilarious results.

As time has gone by, we have built a good relationship together, despite all of the difficulty that living hours apart entails. We have learned to cherish the weekends, winter breaks, and summertime that we get to spend together, which has let us appreciate the other more that we might have otherwise. We just had our 4th Valentines day together, which we spent cooking together, dancing to country music in her living room, and watching her beloved Disney movies. Looking back, I can't help but shake my head at both how we started, and all of the good times that have led to us today.

So everyone, raise your glasses and tip your caps to Dan Brown's 4 star rated novel Deception Point, because it got my relationship of three and a half years started.

You may never read that sentence ever again, which is what makes it beautiful.

The Magnus Effect

When I was a sophomore in college, I took a Creative Writing class that functioned as a writing workshop. As part of the class, we had to submit things that we wrote to get reviewed by the rest of the people in the class. For our first assignment, we had to write a 300 word or less "short." I submitted the following story: 

I twisted the ball in my hands, trying to place my fingers on the seams the way my dad had showed me seconds earlier. The waves crashing twenty feet to my right and the hard-packed sand under my feet were of no consequence at that moment. I brought my right arm back behind me in a circular motion, my elbow making a “t” in relation to my body, before bringing my hand and the ball next to my ear. At this point, I exploded my arm forward, twisting my wrist around the ball as I released it into the thick, coastal air. The baseball, traveling about 50mph, hurtled towards my dad, before making an abrupt, sudden drop, with a slight left-hand turn. The ball seemed to defy physics, my 13-year-old mind didn’t understand how it could change direction so suddenly.

 Sitting in a AP physics class five years later, I would learn about the Magnus effect and how airflow around the seams of the ball caused it to drop and turn through the air. But at that moment, as the ball plummeted towards the earth, the only thing running through my mind was “I cant believe I just did that.” As the ball popped into my fathers catchers mitt, he shouted “Hooo boy, that one snapped off!” A grin seemed to split my face in two as I got my dads approval on my first successful curveball.

 Since that day in July on the shores of Cherry Grove beach, I have thrown many more curveballs. Some have been hit hard, others have resulted in strikeouts, and one curveball badly fooled a catcher and hit him in the mask. No curveball will ever be as special as the one I snapped off to my father for the first time. The popping of the catcher’s mitt and the coastal wind whipping across the beach are forever overmatched by my dads excited voice shouting about the first time I made a baseball bend and hook through the air. That moment is frozen in my mind, for me to look back on and smile. After all, you don’t do something for the first time very often.

After the class, the professor came up to me and said that I had produced a really good writing sample. She happened to have a contact at a online baseball journal, and wanted to know if I was interested in getting my short published. I told her absolutely, and over the next few weeks I talked with the website to get everything worked out. Eventually, this became the first thing I ever got paid to write. I looked recently to try to find this online, to have a record of my first published thing. Sadly, I couldn't find it. 

Stephen King has the opinion that if you write something, and someone gives you a check for it, and that check doesn't bounce, and you use that check to pay a bill, then you can call yourself a professional writer. I am glad to say that the words in italics are the ones that started my writing career. It might not be my best writing, but its the stuff that made me think I have a future in it. 

Yours, Ryan 

I should have watched Mr. Holland's Opus one more time

Looking out across my desk at the bunch of teenagers sitting quietly, I could almost see their thoughts in bubbles, like in comic strips.

“Oh geez, one more day of this grammar review…”

“What is for lunch, I am starving; only 4 hours to go.”

“Sweet! A sub, we won’t be getting anything done today.”

Yup, if you had told me when I was a Senior in high school that I would be on the other side of that desk just two months after getting done with college, I would have literally laughed out loud. 18 year old me knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that teaching was not for me. I would never, ever, EVER teach. Going beyond me not being the most spectacular student, I was positive that I did not have the patience or the determination to get through to students. Ryan Alexander was not meant to teach.

It is funny how much things can change. College has a way of making people grow up, in the classroom and as a person. Not everyone can be away from home for the first time and still uphold all of their responsibilities with no parents or guardians there to keep an eye on things. There is a reason that the fail rate of college freshman has been right around 33% for decades. Some kids, statistically about one out of three, cannot handle going to school on their own away from home. By all measures, I should have been one of those statistics. I wasn’t a good student in high school, I didn’t try hard enough to really do anything noteworthy during those long four years. Based on that alone, I was a contender to be out of college by Thanksgiving of my freshman year, unable to cut it.

But to the shock of literally everyone who knew me in high school, I made it through my first year at Western Carolina. And then I made it through the second. All of a sudden, barring a complete collapse, I was going to make it through college. Those four years in Cullowhee flew by, but come August 5^th 2013, I got my diploma from Western. The job market isn’t so hot at the moment, and getting into writing is more difficult than I ever imagined. After some thought, I figured trying some substitute teaching wouldn’t hurt. If I liked it, I could keep going with it, and if not I could chalk it up as a lesson learned.

So on September 27^th my career as a teacher started. All decked on in my shirt and tie, with nothing but nerves and contingency plans for unruly high school kids rattling around in my head, I stepped off into the great unknown. That first day seemed to take forever. I was nervous and timid, not sure what to say to kids that were only a few years younger than me. Having authority over  kids who looked barely younger than me was a challenge. In fairy tale world, that first day went off without a hitch. In reality, I am sure that I could have improved on my classroom management, and keeping the students busy and on task with their homework.

I have done more sub teaching over the last couple of weeks, and I find myself liking it more and more every time I do it. The teachers that I work with are incredibly helpful, and for the most part the students have been fine. I find myself being proactive and asking students questions about what they are working on, so that I can lend them a hand if they need it. I have learned that I know a lot more than I realized, and actually have some knowledge that the students can use. This past week, I helped a student with complex sentences and the use of dependent and independent clauses, stuff that I haven’t thought about in at least six or seven years.  It is still a shock to hear “Mr. Alexander” whenever kids ask me something, and I made the mistake of telling a student my first name in a conversation when I didn’t mean to say it.

I can see myself sticking to teaching, and helping kids like me be better students and avoid the mistakes that I made in high school. I don’t want these kids to surprise people when they make it through college. If I can help prepare them even a little bit, I will be happy. 

So you can call me Mr. Alexander from now on. I think I am finally used to hearing it.

Your effort is futile

I remember the last time that Western Carolina University won a Southern Conference football game.

It was homecoming weekend in Cullowhee, and The Citadel was in town to play the Catamounts of WCU. The weather was absolutely miserable, maybe 40 degrees at kickoff, even though it was only mid October. In fact, sometime during the second half, it started to snow a little bit.

At this point, Western was still able to convince students to come out to the games. We were still kind of competitive, even though the head coach was a complete jerk as well as a tub of lard. I think he weighed at least 350 pounds. But that is irrelevant to him being a truly terrible football coach and recruiter. Either way, in the good ole days of 2009, WCU was not the joke that it is now in terms of fielding a football team. The Cats could be counted on to keep thinks close most of the time, and at least keep the student body distracted long enough to get outside on the weekends for a few hours.

The Citadel rolled into town, and I remember people talking around the parking lot where my friends and I were tailgating that we might actually win the game. The Citadel was having a down year, and WCU actually had a good chance at pulling out a victory.

Western went into halftime of the game down 10-0, and as soon as the marching band wrapped up their halftime show, the stands started to empty. This happens at every single WCU football game, and is one reason in my mind that our program cannot improve. Who wants to play at a school where the majority of the crowd is there to see a bunch of skinny kids act important for 15 minutes and then go home. The answer is nobody. Until the day that fans stay in their seats past halftime at WCU football games, they will never be good. But I digress.

For once in his life, Dennis Wagner gave a effective halftime speech or made the necessary adjustments at the midpoint of the football game. The Cats came out in the second half and put a whuppin on the cadets from the Citadel. Western shut their opponents out in the second half, and scored with 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter to put the winning number, 14-10, on the board.  I remember the final whistle blowing and jumping the railing onto the field along with what seemed like every student left in the stadium. Everybody ran onto the field to celebrate our first and last victory of the season. Since that day, October 17th 2009, Western has lost every Southern Conference football game it has competed in. 23 in a row.

It is hard to do anything 23 times in a row. 23 is a lot of times to do the same thing over and over again. But WCU has managed to hit the field in the SoCon and get beat 23 times in a row. It is so pathetic it almost makes you want to laugh to keep from crying about it.

Oh yea, I almost forgot:  Go Cats

Adventures upstate

We took the scenic route in.

For an hour and a half, the only things passing by the car windows were trees that were definitely not pine and mountains that bore no resemblance to the ones that I looked at during my four years at Western Carolina University.

Yup, Upstate New York was decidedly different than what I was used to and that was the whole point of this trip. This weekend was meant to be a tour of historic baseball, starting with a ball game at Fenway Park in Boston on Sunday, and then visiting the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown on Monday. One day was 200 miles east, the next 60 miles west of our home base: Albany, NY. In previous years, our baseball trips had been to New York City, and Atlanta on different occasions. But this trip was going to be different. None of us (3 brothers and dad) had ever been to Fenway or the Hall of Fame, so this was going to be a new experience for all involved.

Fenway Park was awesome. Everything I had read about the place beforehand was dead on the money. Yes: the seats are tiny, the fans have an incredible passion for the game, the food is expensive and worth it, the Green Monster is bigger that it looks in person, and the boston accents are really funny to listen to when 37,000 of them are shouting at once. Fenway was as good as advertised.

The really special part of the trip was the Hall of Fame. Words don't really do justice to how excited I was as we drove west from Albany, heading towards a place I had only read about in books and seen on TV. The first thing that hit me when we walked in the front door was the people. Old people, young people, 3 and 4 generations of people waiting to see this hallowed place where America's past time is celebrated.

One thing about Hall of Fames: Most of them are placed terribly. Canton, eh. The basketball Hall of Fame looks like a warehouse on the side of the Mass Turnpike, and that says everything you need about the Naismith Hall of Fame. But Cooperstown is special. It is in the middle of nowhere, so the anticipation builds as you drive 90 minutes from Albany to get to it. And the town of Cooperstown itself is straight out of a Walt Whitman piece about small town America, with storefronts and old tiny ballparks running along side a one lane road, and a beautiful lake sitting just behind the line of trees across the street from the Hall of  Fame.

Walking in to the building was like walking into a church in Rome or something. Knowing that you are about to see history right in front of you was enough of a thought to draw goosebumps. Everything about the place was magical. Seeing the relics from over 150 years ago depicting a game that really didn't look like the baseball I played was incredible, as well as seeing things from the Negro leagues and the dead ball era. Going through 100 years of baseball records with my 13 year old brother was cool, telling him about players that played before my great grandmother was born and relating to players that we saw yesterday in Fenway Park.

The thing about the place that brought tears to my eyes was the plaque room. One huge room shaped like a church sanctuary lined with nothing but the greatest players of the greatest game. Dimaggio, Mantle, Clemente, Gibson, Seaver, all of the players that are the giants of the game are on the walls, with nothing but their likeness in bronze and some letters stamped on steel to show of their mark on the game. And at the front, like the baptismal fount at the front of a church, was the original 5 players inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1936. Wagner, Mathewson, Ruth, Cobb, and Johnson, men who are to baseball what Old Testament heroes are to christians, stand out among the hundreds of standouts that share a room with them.

The thing that I will never forget as long as I live is walking into the plaque room and seeing all of the men on the walls, shining in the bright lights as people shuffled by marveling at their achievements. And highlighted by the way that the room was lined up were the original 5, and it overwhelmed me. The magic of the whole place just kind of washed over me, the way that a catholic must feel looking up at the Sistine Chapel, and before I could help myself, tears were rolling down my face. I imagine that I am not the first person overcome by the Baseball Hall of Fame and the magic that it possesses.

One day, after a scenic drive from Albany into Cooperstown, past the shops and the lake glistening just out of sight, my kids will be overcome by the magic of a place that my dad shared with me. With that first glimpse into the plaque room,  the tradition of passing down the Hall of Fame from father to son will continue as another lover of the greatest game marvels in it's majesty.

My age 21 season

Last night, I sat down to watch the first couple innings of the MLB All Star game. I wanted to see how Matt Harvey would pitch, and after he was done, I kept the game on as background noise while I was piddling around on my computer.

So I am sitting on the couch of my apartment, and the first pitch of the game is a blistering 97 mile-per-hour tailing fastball on the outer half of the plate, and the batter ripped it opposite field down the first base line and busted into second base with a head first slide for a double.

That batter was Mike Trout, and he is 6 month's younger than I am. 22 year old all-stars are uncommon, but not extraordinarily rare. Al Kaline was 20 years old, and Bryce Harper was 20 when he was named last year as a rookie. In fact, Manny Machado is only 21 years old, and he was Trout's teammate last night.

What makes Mike Trout special is last year in his age 20 season, he had one of the best season's in baseball history. His 10.9 wins above replacement (by Fangraphs calculations) was good enough for 21st ALL TIME, and he came one stolen base short of joining the 30-50 club, something that has only been done twice in baseball history.

Trout is hitting at the same level this season, and playing damn good defense in the outfield on top of it all. After he hit that leadoff double, I googled some stuff about Mike Trout.  Apparently, he dates a supermodel, makes over $500,000 a year playing baseball, and is a genuinely nice guy.

Needless to say, I am a little bit jealous of Mike Trout. I don't have a job that pays $500,000 a year. In fact I am in the middle of looking for a job that pays me anything at all. Last year I finished up my last year of school, and I would say that I did pretty good in the classroom and with my on-campus job. I did not, however, have the 21st best year ever as a student, or as a journalist. Not even close.

I would feel really bad that a guy younger than me is much better at his job, at a younger age, than I ever will be at my job. But the more I think about it, some guys are just really damn good. So, Mr. Mike Trout, I will tip my hat to you and say good day sir.

Nice hit, by the way. I liked the way you went with the pitch last night.

Who says you can't go home?

Robert Frost wrote and said many brilliant things in his long life. He wrote The Mending Wall, Fire and Ice, and Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening. He quipped "In three words I can sum up everything I have learned about life: it goes on," a statement that seems to grace every high school graduates Facebook wall at some point or another. He read at John F. Kennedy's inauguration and is lauded as one of the giants of American literature along with Fitzgerald, Hemingway, and Twain.

That intro sounds a little bit like the intro to a American Lit paper in college, and I am sorry for that, but I must admit that Frost is probably my favorite author to read along with Stephen King and Pat Conroy. I got to thinking about old Bobby Frost tonight because I am going home for the first time in almost 2 months Wednesday, and whenever I head home one quote pops into my head.

Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.

Every time that I get in the car, or the plane, or the whatever to go home after a long absence I think of that quote. Whether I am driving my old Buick through the Blue Ridge mountains from Western, or back to the piedmont from Chapel Hill, I think about that quote. Home is where they have to take you in. Where they won't shut the door and fasten the latch when I shake the dust from my shoes on the porch. Where I can always find something to eat without feeling guilty for mooching. Home is where things just feel right.

When I think of home, I think of a myriad of things. Home is seeing my twin brother and asking him to play catch in the front yard, whipping the ball from the driveway to the edge of our yard no matter what the weather is and how in shape our arms are. It is sitting down to talk ball with my dad and watching the hours slip away as we talk about all of the plays and stories that we've seen. Home is walking in the front door of my mom's house and talking about the books that we love and hate. Home is her helping me bust out of the terrible writers block I am stuck in, or looking over a paragraph that she can't quite end the right way. Home is knowing the way to my gramma's house even if it had been months since I have been there. It's knowing that I will smell brownies or cookies, or a delicious southern meal as I walk in the door.

It has been a shamefully long time since I have been home. I feel really bad about letting two months go by and not seeing the people who have known me the longest. I've been painfully busy with work and an internship, but I don't feel like that is a valid excuse. I should have figured out a way to make it two hours down the road at some point in the last couple of months.

The good news is that I am going home Wednesday, and spending four glorious days seeing my family without any worries of work or bills or anything. I get to chill with both of my brothers, have lunch with my gramma, and zip line; that is just Wednesday. I don't know the rest of the itinerary of my visit, but I know that it will go my much too fast and I will have to go back to the real world sooner than I would like.

Home. Just thinking about it makes me wish tomorrow flies by and I am heading west down I-40 with blue skies pointing me in the right direction.

Little brothers

"Nathan, how do you tell Jordan and Ryan apart?" my mom asked one day while we were all riding in the car somewhere.

"Talk"

It is a simple thing, but I had never really thought how my 4 year old brother told us apart when he was younger. Now that he is older, obviously he can tell us apart. Little Nate isn't so little anymore, he is 13 and about as tall as I am, which isn't saying much. 

Nathan is turning into a pretty exceptional young man. It isn't because of sports, or because he is incredibly popular, or has the most friends out of the kids that go to his school. He is exceptional in the way that should be awarded most for kids his age, the way that he is as a student. 

I remember two years ago at this time going to a 5th grade graduation ceremony for his 5th grade class, and all of the kids wanted to be president, or a dancer, or an actress, or a pro athlete. Nate stood up and said he wanted to be a doctor. Lofty goals are normal for 11 year old kids, and they don't really mean anything. A lot changes between 11 and 18. But the thing that I really remember is when they were awarding a citizenship award, something only two kids would get. And as the teacher stood up talking about this student who came in everyday with a great attitude and willingness to learn, she started to tear up. A thought crossed my mind that the kid she is talking about must really be special. So when she said "It is my honor to present this award to Na-" No way she is saying Nate, "-te Alexander," my mom let out this little gasp and started to cry, and I will admit that when my little brother walked to get that award, some dust got in my eye or my allergies kicked up all of a sudden. Nate was two out of 300 kids to get an award, and up to that point I had never been more proud of him. 

Last year I got home from school, and one day my mom asked if I was going to the award ceremony again. I told her I wouldn't miss it, and asked if I could bring my girlfriend, who Nate has always liked and I thought he would like seeing her there. My mom said that it was a surpsrise that we would be there, he didn't know he was winning an award that year. It had been his first year at our local I.B school, and he did great just like we had anticipated. He brought home the reflection award, for taking in everything that he learned and kind of synthesizing it to make it a part of his life. The awards were for the top 10% of his class, something that is pretty hard to do with all of the students competing in this academically focused environment that is an IB school. 

I saw on Facebook today that Nate brought home an award again today for the third year in a row. This time it was a "Most Principled" award, given for acting with "integrity and honesty, with a strong sense of fairness, justice and respect for the dignity of the individual, groups and communities. He takes responsibility for his own actions and the consequences that accompany them." I am sad that I wasn't able to be there to see him get his award, and when I texted him he acted like it was no big deal that he was being recognized again. When you are 13 it is hard to see the forest because of the trees sometimes, and maybe when he gets older he will realize what a big deal winning these awards is. I was never recognized in anything for my school work, it was a miracle some years that I got through the year in one piece. I think that Nate is going to do great thing, big things, things that I won't be able to do because I am not gifted with whatever it is makes him do well in school. I am really proud of him, and I cannot wait to see the man he is going to become.  

I'm proud of you Nater. 

Love, Ryan