Following up on Wednesday’s post, I must now ask myself, what is the worst part of Eyeblack Odyssey?
Well, okay, I don’t have to do this, but I’m doing it anyway. Fortunately, my answer is a relatively easy thing to pinpoint.
(Note: don’t keep reading if you hate spoilers of any kind)
The worst part is no doubt the postgame frustrations after the Mississippi State game, and what those meant for my book, for me, and for my marriage.
Ultimately, some idiocy on my part led to a fracturing of the quest itself, keeping me from actually attending a different game every weekend. And is the book worse off for it? I’m not sure, to tell you the truth, but it’s certainly different than it would have been. And I had to be a dumbass for it to get to that point. That’s the “fun” part.
I could, upon request, name the top five things in my life, and there is no doubt that at any given moment, my wife would be in it. In fact, she’d be at the top of the list. So what happens when you stop acting like that? I have seen the results, mostly because I am an idiot. And MSU pissed me the hell off because it didn’t have to go down like that.
I always have this reaction (anger) to any disagreement with my wife, and it is with good reason. Usually, it’s over something incredibly stupid like what we’re eating for dinner. So I get angry with myself for even letting it get to that point. “Why are we fighting over fried rice?”
But this is not even the extent of it. I get mad at myself for ANY disagreement. Any fight. Any stupid snarky comment. Because that’s not how you treat someone you find so valuable. At least it’s not how they should be treated.
So the worst part of the book, partly because it deals with this time period/subject matter (which dredges up really pleasant memories) and partly because writing about such matters is a difficult chore in the first place (and perhaps this is conveyed in the writing?), is easily the MSU postgame. Florida won, so that didn’t help (rimshot!), but really, it was all about what we were carrying with us at that point, and what we were carrying wasn’t a whole lot of fun.
Eyeblack Odyssey not fun? For shame! But alas, this is how it was.
I’m thankful I gained some perspective out of that whole deal. And if the book tells the story of a happy marriage (with an idiot husband putting some of the wrong things on pedestals), well good. The perspective gained was transferred onto the reader. And maybe somebody can even learn from it.
Maybe somebody can learn: Don’t fight over fried rice.
