South City Confessions: Can life be just a little easier?

A quick commentary adrenaline shot for your reading pleasure.

I could come here and dish on the Oscars and their latest show, but that’s a bore for most readers the day after the winners are announced. Conan O’Brien did a great job hosting, but he wasn’t on the stage enough to keep me watching past an hour. It was like loving a recurring character on a television show only to find the stars of the show less inviting. The winners weren’t exactly predictable, even if the interest level in the nominees wasn’t as strong as in recent years. So, I watched for an hour and then read the list of winners like the NFL Draft the following morning.

Anora is a fine film with some unique staying power--but is it the best film of the year? Not for me. It did only cost $6 million, so that’s a big win for indies everywhere with it winning Best Picture, Screenplay, Actress, and Editing. That was Sing Sing, which garnered one nominee for Best Actor, Colman Domingo. Like most years, the movies I loved received little to zero love from the Academy. The best part about the big wins for Sean Baker’s Anora? It cost $6 million to make.

I could dish about the St. Louis Blues for the few subscribers who care and watch hockey regularly. They won four in a row and then lost a game in ugly fashion to the Dallas Stars. They will be incapable of reaching (or doing anything once there) in the playoffs if they can’t string together more wins. Four wasn’t enough. Their next game is crucial because another back-and-forth win/loss streak won’t pull them out of the dirt. The Blues remain an “almost there” team instead of a deadlock. How much time does an in-between team deserve? One enormous paragraph is the answer.

Let’s talk about life instead. The endless slog through positive and negative reactions coupled with the oncoming pass rush of whatever is around the corner. Everyday job, bills, kids, pets, personal time, and the unseeable hazards that arise with no warning. Right when I think there’s a method to the madness, something new pops up to knock me on my ass. Imagine if life consists of doing a good job at work, being a good person, and staying out of trouble.

There’s so much more to it than that, and the little things trip you up. The ability of bad traffic or a few pet accidents to steer an otherwise sunny day into a stormy ditch. The interaction with someone who looks like hell washed over them can send a decent afternoon down the pike. Don’t look for a playbook because someone wrote one long ago and burned it.

Every day, I wonder if I am being a good enough human, husband, or father to my kid. Most of the time, the answer is like asking a film critic if they liked a movie right after the screening ended. “It’s fine,” as the esteemed Jim Tudor would say. I often don’t believe the answer that comes out of my head. Do you?

The cry for a stunt double can only be replaced by needing more time to figure this world out. Politics or whoever is in the office plays a minor part in my life. It’s all about choices and making the right ones, a practice that isn’t precisely book-worthy. I wish there were a replay station after certain big decisions were made, like a couple of commentators reviewing it.

“By bypassing the chance to make a left at the previous light, Dan screwed himself over for the next few blocks. Only time will tell if the fast food sitting in his front seat will completely obliterate his afternoon or stab a hole in his early morning. Stay tuned for more adulting with a man who looks like he’s too fast to be furious.”

What I’m getting at here are the shifts in life, day to day, can be so rigorous and resolute that keeping up with the necessary things like work and play are tougher than they should be. Think of a quarterback being blitzed from multiple angles with no offensive line for protection.

What can a man do? Appreciate the little things like a couple fingers of bourbon after a long day. Laugh a little. Cry a little. Pick yourself up and get busy living, because a lot of folks didn’t make it to 43. Pardon my soapbox anthem, but today was an unusual asskicker. But Monday got stabbed early this morning after my first delivery in Olivette, found another wound in Lake St. Louis 30 minutes later, and continues to die as I write this.

Days come and go. Stress arrives and leaves. Tomorrow always has a chance to be better. Tom Hanks once put a nice spin on a classic Winston Churchill line. “This too shall pass” can mean good times or bad. Whatever is going on, it will pass off into something else.

Still, if I had to say one thing about the Oscars, I’d say let Conan host again next year and turn him even more loose. He did a good job for a guy who lost his home in a wildfire this winter.

Thanks for reading and goodnight,

DLB

“Don’t worry about what went wrong. Just focus on making it right.”-Reacher