@YouTheReader even though this song just came out, I already feel like I lived through these lyrics so I promise to handle this one delicately. I genuinely don’t want to hurt somebody on the other end with this, but this feels like something I need to get out of my Back Pocket. Zach Bryan and Maggie Rogers haven’t even produced @RapGenius annotations yet, so I’ll give it my best shot.
The hardest part for people going through any sort of struggle to comprehend is that it can get better with the passage of time if you allow it. Most people when they are in a dark part of their life find it very hard to get out of bed in the morning so they spend a lot of their time sitting around which only leads to overthinking, hence “what do I do?” In my case, I had trouble sleeping at night which leads to overthinking.
When Zach would get out of bed, he would turn to alcohol as a way to cope. Drinking after a breakup is extremely common. Some would even recommend it as the first stage of “getting out there again”, but like Zach, I would take it to the extreme. Once you get a taste of love, like any drug/alcohol, it is very easy to seek more of it once it is gone.
All is fair in love and war is a common saying used to describe a situation in which people do not follow the usual rules of behavior and do things that are normally considered unfair. (Source: Merriam Webster Dictionary) Everybody who has been in a relationship that didn’t last can relate to people currently going through it, but the one thing that is unique with every relationship is that no two are the same. Every person and couple has their own story, so even when you’re a friend just looking out for somebody, it’s impossible to really put yourselves in their shoes and what they lived through that got them to this dark place. Saying things like “it takes time” and “work on yourself” are the right advice to give to someone if they ask you “what do I do”, but they have to figure it out on their own. If you read me out from here on down, I get a bit more personal, but I promise I’m coming from a good place.
I left North Carolina at 4 AM to beat the traffic. I still remember barely getting any sleep the night before and hearing the alarm was dreadful. I didn’t want to leave, but I had to. I wrote her a letter the day before and handed it to her as we said goodbye. The letter basically said that I know this is probably it, I’ll always miss you, and told her to “go off Queen.” She did nothing wrong, she had dreams of her own, and I was only going to hold her back. I knew it then but didn’t want to admit it out loud. Even though I knew it would hurt like hell, I wanted her to be happy and that would include meeting new people. As I drove back home at dawn to my mother’s home in Pearl River, NY, I’m man enough to admit I cried all 10 hours.
During COVID and prior to the breakup, music to me felt dead. Even Drake releasing a new album during that time felt pointless. When I got back home, nothing was the same. It was so bizarre that even Pearl River didn’t feel like home to me anymore. It was the middle of COVID. The country was in absolute turmoil. People couldn’t even celebrate Christmas with their families and honestly, I was such a mess that I didn’t want to see anybody anyway. My one small victory at the time was drinking Guinness in outdoor plastic igloos that sat on NYC streets right outside empty bars and crashing on my friend’s couch on the weekends. My friends were there for me and I can’t thank them enough, but I was numb to everything, except the lyrics in music - they started to mean something to me again.
I wasted many nights wondering about what I could do. @YouTheReader why do I feel like this song REALLY hits home for me enough to write about this on Week to Week Notes, a startup side-hustle sports publication? Well, for starters Zach Bryan is a huge Lumineers fan, he even has a tattoo of an album of theirs on his left arm. Secondly, he posted a song called “Paint” by Paper Kites insinuating that it was an inspiration to Dawns. The number of times I listened to the lyrics “how little you know, how little you know” while walking my dogs or tossing&turning in bed at night was ungodly. Most importantly, she is the one that introduced me to Maggie Rogers’ music.
I still sometimes to this day think about what she did right after I left with a packed-up car at dawn. We only spoke over the phone one time during the middle of one of the nights I couldn't sleep. She mentioned that she had become much closer with the friends she made while we were down there. I’ll admit a part of me felt sad&sorry for myself, but I was mainly relieved for her. We moved down there in the middle of COVID and the first time we really went out to make friends, *I caught COVID and she lost taste&smell. Mind you - this was a time when even North Carolina was strictly locked down so whatever your thoughts are on the virus today, they were likely different back then. My point is, it’s kind of hard to meet new people once you’re a grown-up and the virus isolating people didn’t help.
*That is actually a funny story that maybe I can keep in my Back Pocket for a much later time.
While I was down there, she had just started her career as an SLP, something I learned a bit about through dating her, and something that I knew she worked really hard for. She graduated top in her grad school program. Even though she had just started her new career, I could tell there was a part of her that believed she could do something bigger than the both of us. She would come home from work sometimes a bit flustered and I was in no frame of mind to really know what she meant. I was too busy worrying about myself, trying to get a job for four months while taking this online sports analytics course called “Math Behind Moneyball” that I found really interesting but felt pointless. I was in Year 6 of writing Week to Week Notes only for League 10965. Everybody that I would talk to would tell me this is a tough time to “find a job and take this time for yourself” so I decided to really take a peek into writing about sports. Every 5th job I would apply to would have something to do with sports writing or sports analytics and they all would ask for previously written work. There was no way in hell I would send the stuff I was posting to my best friends privately in League 10965 so I decided to start messing around with a Website for Week to Week Notes. It felt pointless though.
One more thing I’ll try to add in the Maggie Rogers section is that when she and I first started dating I would do these small write-ups about players on the Yankees. In many ways, we were complete opposites. She really wasn’t into sports, but she was an awesome sport and I think she genuinely enjoyed going on dates to Yankee games. Anyway, she mentioned from time to time that I was good at the small paragraphs on players, which were fun for me to do for her and felt effortless because I already was writing for League 10965. I didn’t really think much of it. I’d joke that I should create a Sports Instagram account targeting girlfriends who are dating sports-obsessed guys, but it felt like a ridiculous pipe dream that would never go anywhere. So yeah, if you’re a guy or girl who already knows sports and wishes I would get more in-depth with the stats&such, trust me I can go there, but I don’t want to turn off people who come here for more than just the numbers&names. I write for both segments of the population.
@YouTheReader trust me, I’m not doing this to get her back. It’s been a while now and I’ve already made my peace with everything for quite some time, as I’m sure she has too. She is happy and I can honestly say I’m so proud of her because she deserves to be. When I first moved back to my mom’s house back in Pearl River, I was still unemployed so for about 3 weeks I spent most of my days writing, not about sports, but about how she and I first met. I was about 60 pages in before I thought it felt pointless so I stopped. I don’t want her or anyone to worry about those 60 pages because 1) I would’ve never published it and 2) the MacBook I had while I was down there finally crashed so it’s gone anyway.
@YouTheReader if you ever think “wow this guy is ‘working’ like a lunatic,” well it’s because I don’t just entirely write Week to Week Notes for myself. I do it for my friends who were the first to start reading these ramblings and I do it for the people who were giving me the signs of encouragement all along, even when I was just stumbling along through life.
As I said, I’m already at peace with all this. I never knew how or if I would ever address my drive back home at dawn. I swear I targeted this song called Dawns as soon as Zach Bryan announced Maggie Rogers was on it, but I had no idea what the lyrics were going to be. I guess it’s just a sign that hit me in the face that everything that dies in some way makes its way back. Hearing the lyrics to this song struck a chord in me that I numbed down, but it was a part of my life that I’ll always be proud of. @YouTheReader I’m in my Rookie Season as a writer who wants to focus on sports first&foremost but when something about life like this connects, what do I do? I have no idea if she’ll ever read this and if she does I hope she doesn’t hate me for it, but she was my best friend and the writer in me had to get this part of my life out of my Back Pocket. It’ll help me get my Dawns back.
YouTube Rabbithole
Thanks Dan!
@YouTheReader I’m not worried about if Zach or Maggie see this post today. I already got my one small victory earlier this week while I was writing these Notes when Dan “Big Cat” Katz sent me my personalized video for being a Stella Blue Coffee member. I drink Stella Blue Coffee first thing every morning, it is what fuels me during my Dawns before Guinness and keeps me up at night so that I can write. I first started doing my small Yankee write-ups for her during my lunch breaks at my first job out of college. It was there that I started listening to this podcast called “Pardon My Take.” I’ll be honest, Big Cat is a huge reason I initially ever thought it’d be possible to infuse a diehard fan’s perspective with my own awful attempts at comedy so that casual fans of sports may get some insight the next time they’re at a bar. I doubt he’s ever read any of Week to Week Notes, although I did provide the link in my Stella Blue Coffee member questionnaire, so who knows? Either way pretty cool that he is spot on - my coaches in little league and high school called me Tommy. @YouTheReader is it cool with you if I insinuate that he gave me words of encouragement saying Tom is a “good name. Tank engine. Just keeps going up the f***** hill full of Stella Blue Coffee.” Thanks Dan!
Thanks for reading. Alright, I’m a ball full of emotions after this one and I’m going to need a pint or two, cheers!