2025: Chapter Five

May 25th:

I bought my dad an air fryer the other day. He still doesn’t understand the utility of such a machine. When a couple weeks ago I told him I was going to buy one for him and that it would quote change his life, he seemed perplexed. Then a couple weeks later, on this most recent Thursday when I visited him after I got my haircut, he told me he had done research on air fryers and said:

‘I can’t use it to heat up my coffee,’ and

‘I can’t use it to melt cheese,’ and

‘It uses up like a million volts of electricity,’ and so on.

Always my dad is focused on the wrong shit, but it’s, like, cute. The way he goes about it, I mean. At least half of this man’s diet revolves around garbage that he heats up in the microwave. When finally he was done protesting the reasons why an air fryer was unnecessary, or that it served no purpose, I basically just said all the shit he eats is easier to make and tastes better in an air fryer. He wants to make it complicated; I’m trying to keep it simple.

I wish my mom and brothers needed things like that. Things like air fryers. I was too depressed around Christmastime to buy them anything for Christmas, but then my younger brother’s birthday passed in April, and then my older brother’s birthday passed in May, and then Mother’s Day passed, and still I didn’t get them anything. I don’t think I’m a very thoughtful person.

And I know none of them care, but it does make me feel bad sometimes. Last year I did the same thing around their birthdays (by not getting them anything), and then on my mom’s birthday — July 4th — I bought each of them a bunch of shit. That made me feel better. I bought my little brother a set of cast iron skillets because he likes to cook, I bought my older brother a bunch of Dr. Squatch soap — since when we lived together he and I always liked to use Dr. Squatch — and I got my mom the same thing I always get her… A gift card for Southwest Airlines.

The only reason any of this is worth mentioning is due to the fact that in spite of some of the deficiencies, or, like, criticisms I have of my immediate family members, all of them are actually incredibly thoughtful when it comes to gifts. I am and always have been the most difficult person to shop for on my birthday and Christmas, and every year they have one gift for me — but usually more than one — where it’s like You Have To Open This One Last, because it’s special. And then it’s something really nice and as I’m driving home all I can think about is how great of an idea it was, and how I feel incapable thinking of something similar for them.

For several years I have felt high and mighty, in a manner of speaking, insofar as interpersonal relationships with my family are concerned. Because for years they relied upon me. Moving from my apartment in Redlands CA to help them with the rent in Riverside CA. Shouldering the load of all the finances with my mom when both of my brothers were going to dealer school. Buying my little brother his first car because he didn’t have any credit and I was the only one who had the credit and the money to use as a down payment. Things of that nature.

And I feel like a real cunt because on the inside, in a way that I would never speak of aloud, or even allude to in real life in any sort of way, I’ve felt as if it has given me leverage over everybody. That I was that guy. That I didn’t need them but they needed me. I hate that about myself. That I use(d) such a mentality to justify why it’s OK that I am so goddamn un-thoughtful towards the people I love most. I tell myself that they need — and have needed — me for reasons other than great gift ideas. I tell myself that my value is reserved for other, more important matters.

May 26th:

Which is probably why I find my dad to be so cute. Because he doesn’t own basic items such as air fryers. I don’t have to be thoughtful when it relates to my dad, since he is lacking in basic utilities that don’t require much thought but still offer him a real service. That make him feel special. And he always does the song and dance that some old men do when it comes to so-called ‘new’ technologies; he says he doesn’t need them; he tells me all the things they can’t do; yet I know for a fucking fact that once he saw it (the air fryer) on his doorstep a few days after our most recent visit he was genuinely excited about it. That he will go online and look up all the things an air fryer can do. That the next time he goes grocery shopping he will actively seek out foods that he can cook in the air fryer, just so he can tell me all about it the next time I see him. It’s fucking cute.

It is thus why each of my brothers — and mother, by extension — are so intellectually frustrating for me. Because they know that I love them and would do anything for them, but I can’t feel like I am making them happy, or feel as if I am being thoughtful, in the thoughtless way I can with my dad. In other words, the low-hanging fruit (such as an air fryer) that satiates my dad is not at my disposal with the rest of my family. It’s not as easy with them. And I like easy.

Anyway, these are mostly idle thoughts. I think what I’m really saying is that I care very much about my brothers and my mom, and I don’t know how to make them feel as special as they make me feel. Even for my birthday this year, in March, my brothers drove out to come visit me in the desert for the first time since I moved out here last year. They didn’t get me anything. They simply showed up. And in a strange way it was one of my favorite birthdays that I’ve ever had, because it gave me the chance to drive them around this area they’ve never seen, and witness where it is I work, where I like to spend my downtime, and so on.

Don’t get me wrong, if we are taking accounts or looking up at the scoreboard or having like pelts on the wall then it is probably, if not undeniably, an objective fact that I have carried my weight and been pound-for-pound the MVP for my nuclear family over the last decade. I have given the most and received the least. I’ve both experienced and overcome more adversity. All those conversations about being everything and nothing, all at once, is what I’ve embodied over these years. And I’ve been almost proud to. To be that person for my family. I would rather it be me than anyone else.

But, you know, there’s an old saying that asks: What Have You Done For Me Lately? I know it’s cool to be, and take pride in being, the breadwinner of one’s family, but the truth is all of my hard work over the years — from moving back in to help with the rent, to convincing my brothers to become dealers, to assuming the financial burden when they both were in dealer school, to buying my younger brother’s first car, et. al — made life more comfortable on all of us, and, in turn, has led me to, again, want, er, expect more from myself. With them in mind, I mean.

During hard times it is so much easier to focus on what is most important. During hard times everything regarding my family (but more specifically my brothers) was such a step-by-step process. We had to knock down this domino before we got to that one. And then we had to knock down that one before we got to the next one, and onwards. It was quite beautiful and romantic to see it unfold in front of me, while it was happening, the progress I mean, but even at that I couldn’t ever really appreciate it because it was such a sacrifice at the time. It’s only looking back on it that I’m able to be, like, Yo, We Really Did That.

May 28th:

Today was one of those rare days that I wouldn’t exactly call perfect, per se, but it was really great. I woke up and had a fair amount of energy. I went for a run that was neither boring (in the sense that it was too easy) nor too extravagant (where it was too challenging insofar as my current fitness is concerned). I didn’t run into any hiccups or like speed-bumps over the course of the day where my brain was playing tricks on me and I felt any anxiety. Today was Just Right, in other words.

And then I went to work and was part of this really sharp group of craps dealers — the type of crew that, on paper, I looked forward to working with before the night started — and most nights when there’s a really good craps crew we are let down by there not being any worthwhile action (i.e. good tippers). But not tonight. It was an almost ideal marriage between between having a strong unit of craps dealers, and action, and making money. It was the type of night which reminded me of why I love so much dealing craps and why back in October I decided to abandon the comforts of day shift and make the move back to the night shift.

Whether or not any of that is worth mentioning is of no consequence. I tried my best to piggyback off the good vibes of my last blog, the one about running, and coming to relative terms with the woman I want, but I think what really happened was that I set a new baseline, or standard, moving forward. One that involved running. One that shifted my point of view with Nohemi — otherwise known as my ‘favorite.’

The problem is: Once that baseline (or standard) became reset, I suddenly realized that I was not in the midst of scaling a mountain but rather starting anew at the base of another one. Mountain, that is. Being faithful again to running was an important start. Adjusting my expectations with Nohemi was also a necessary undertaking. These were and are what I would consider to be good things.

Yet if now we are on the other side of the so-called looking glass, what we see is that running no longer (such as when I started a few weeks ago) improves my mood but rather works as a hindrance when I don’t do it, and I am no closer to obtaining Nohemi as I was when my mindset was geared more for instant gratification. In other words, running or no running, right-mindset (vis-a-vis Nohemi) or wrong-mindset (vis-a-vis the same), I am still more or less in the same position that I was in before this quasi-transformation I initiated towards the beginning of May.

Maybe it had been so long since I had taken such a seismic intrapersonal leap that it really felt, like, major to me. Maybe I forgot that at this point in my life there is no such thing as a seismic leap. That everything is merely a step that hopefully goes in the right direction. That in all the time after Niña’s death where I felt as if I was stuck in one specific place, in reality I was spiraling down, or tumbling back. However you want to say it. That actually I lost progress. And by doing such simple things as running again, or feeling as if someone I care deeply about should pick back up where we left off, and care about me in the same fashion, I’m really back at square one. That that is where this progress has led me.

May 29th:

I was talking to Sarah the other day about my family, specifically in terms of how difficult a time they are having procuring a new house to rent. About how much it’s stressing out my mother. About how my mother is prone to being stressed out, anyway, and how she has self-esteem issues being a middle-aged divorcee, all of which contribute to her alcoholism — which doesn’t help anything.

Sarah is a good person to talk to about things. About life, in general. I have waxed poetic in the past with regards to Sarah, and I love that she has become that person for me. She’s the one I can call upon any time about any thing — or nothing — and while her and I do possess a substantial amount of crossover in terms of when we were born, and what it was like growing up, and personal life experiences, the reason she is so important to me, and why, exactly, she is that person for me, is because we’re actually not alike at all. She is so many things that I am not. And I need to hear her perspective through each crossroad I’m negotiating through.

This specific conversation, with Sarah, was more about how I am not there for my family. Not anymore. I can’t help them find a new place to move. I can’t give my mother a pep talk every day or two, out in our backyard in Riverside CA, like we used to do so often, to help put her in the right mindset when she is feeling low. I can’t provide any sort of leadership, or be the guy that is needed. Who didn’t necessarily seek the responsibility, but who provided it nonetheless.

But then in the middle of all these things I lament, I sort of told Sarah that I need to learn how to let go. That my family needs to figure these things out for themselves. And she agreed, Sarah did. Which was nice. It’s just always been so hard for me to take my hands off of the wheel when I feel as if I know what’s best. I’m due to talk to my mom in a couple days and we’ll be on the phone for 45 minutes or an hour or something before I can tell that she is starting to get trashed and so I will save all my comments that are worth a damn before that time comes. I’ll try not to lean too hard on her, this way or that.

In other news, my older brother recently accepted a transfer to become a dual-rate at the casino he works at, meaning he will be a full-time employee with benefits. My younger brother told me on my birthday (when my older brother was in the restroom) that he had plans of auditioning for roulette and switching casinos. I think that’s great. I love that my brothers are taking sincere responsibility for themselves and that I had had no part in it.

May 31st:

I didn’t in any way intend to turn this blog into a literal day-by-day like journal entry type bitch, but, as they say: here we are. I actually think it’s really funny how unintentionally this space of mine drips with irony. It was only six months ago — during my November, 2024 article — that I declared 2025 would be the year I stepped away from my high-frequency longform predilections in lieu of venturing off into storytelling. In other words, I am now exercising the opposite. Yes, I am still writing a story on the side. But I am back to my roots. Writing about the minor, insignificant details of everyday life.

I’m sure there are a myriad of reasons for why I came home, in a manner of speaking, but it’s inescapable that the biggest was — if you will forgive the obvious beating of this dead horse — Niña. Though my (ongoing) story about a family from Iowa acted as a quite excellent distraction for me during the first quarter of 2025, the diversion it offered me emotionally, and psychologically, clearly ran its course or, like, expired on me. I could only suppress these thoughts and feelings for so long before ultimately I would have to express them in the only way I know how.

I wasn’t aware how such a communiqué would manifest itself on my blog until inevitably at the end of March I clicked on the New Post option on WordPress, thus confronting me with a blank slate. It was immediately then when I felt the love for this medium come back to me. My brain was ignited. My stomach was full. My hands woke up. My fingers and fingertips were able to get back to work once more.

If Niña hadn’t died I honestly believe that I could have made it a whole year without writing on here. I have no doubt, actually. Because even in January and February and for the better part of March, each time I felt the urge to blog about my life it was pride that kept me away. My pride said no — No Thank You. That I said in November I would spend a full year away, and a full year it would be.

But it’s complicated, you know? Niña’s death was and is the most difficult life event I have ever experienced, or dealt with, or, like, gone through, and so what is my measly little prideful nature in comparison to that? It’s nothing, really. Circumstances are circumstantial, and they always will be. Everyone has a plan until they get hit. Cliché after cliché.

And Niña’s passing, as it relates to my stupid blog, has taught me that life literally is a day-by-day process. That there is absolutely nothing wrong with treating a blog as if it were a journal-entry type of experience. I think originally that’s what blogs were intended for. It’s certainly how I used them from day one on Xanga. It’s how I used them when I was an editor on the Texas Rangers blogs I once wrote for. It was only after years — decades, even — of using blogging as my main medium of choice that I decided to complicate matters and make a vague attempt at doing more.

The foundations of addiction, whether it’s alcohol, or narcotics, or gambling, try to convey this same message. One day at a time. That’s all this is. That’s what life is. That is the only cliché that glides over all the rest and stands the test of time. For several years I have shied away from the normalcy or, like, basic-ness that journaling represents. It was Kanye West who once said that First They Love You, Then They Hate You, Then They Love You Again. I suppose that is where I now find myself. Returning to the original intention of blogs.

June 1st:

I wrote last year about the fantasy football league with which I happen to be the commissioner of despite being the youngest member of a 10-man group. We renamed the league in 2024 after our good friend Dave Lewis passed away. And we had a moment, when I was giving the commissioner’s speech right before we began the draft, about how Dave meant something to all of us — and what he meant to me, personally — and it was a necessary moment to have. It reinforced to all of us that there’s a lot of love between us (as a group), and amongst us, and it turned out to be a really nice, drama-free season of fantasy football.

And I already know, even now, some two-and-a-half months away from our next draft in The Dave Lewis Hot Water Fantasy Football League, one where I will make another pre-draft speech as commissioner, that Niña will be part of it. I probably won’t mention her by name, but everyone’s gonna know what I’m talking about. When I preface such a speech by invoking Dave Lewis’s name once more. When I say that last year I lost a loved one. And so on.

Because whether it is fantasy football with my friends, or my life in general, the message I aim to convey is that this is something we all love to do. It is something which annually each of us look forward to. And that we should appreciate this time that we still have together. I’m sure I’ll be blending in some humor to add levity to a heavy-sounding sort of pre-draft speech, since I am actually not as big of a bummer in real life as I tend to sound like on this blog. But it’s genuine, where I come from. I think that’s why my friends — and most of my closest ones happen to be in this fantasy football league — love me. I’m a real person.

What I mean to say is that not everybody is capable of finding these landmarks, these singular days and nights, these trivial and unimportant events, that make life worth living. Some have had enough, and spend their time merely holding on. The past remains too close, and of too much import, and the future too far away, and too goddamn unobtainable. I understand it from both ends, for I have been on both ends. It is a choice to be here. It always has been and it always will be.

And that is why I say that if blogging must for me evolve from a caterpillar into a butterfly and back into a caterpillar, so it is. If once it was a day-by-day process and somewhere, in some time, it turned into a month-by-month exploration, or grew complicated enough to imagine itself as some living and breathing organism that was centered around Big Ideas, so it is. Because it’s love. That’s why I do it. Where it exists right now — Future Bets, that is — is as a humble caterpillar. It is a day-by-day experiment. One day at a time. That’s as close and as far away as it can ever be.

Love you Niña,

ER