Okay, so I am a little late, as matches started today, but I just didn't get to writing about the French Open yesterday. Historically I have filled out brackets much like how most people do for the NCAA basketball tournament. I haven't done so in a while, but I still formulate outcomes and scenarios in my head. Let's take a look at what's in store:
Rafa's quarter:
Rafa has been tabbed with having a difficult draw, and it's true that it isn't exactly a cakewalk. He's the king of clay, though, and the greatest ever at Roland Garros. That said, he's as vulnerable as he's ever been on this surface coming into the event, having a run of some surprising losses this clay court season. He should destroy Ginepri in the first round, followed by a potential second round matchup with Dominic Thiem, a very nice young player. He doesn't have what it takes at this point to trouble Nadal, though. He has a potentially dangerous fourth round competitor in Nicolas Almagro, a great clay court player who actually defeated Nadal this year on the surface. I don't believe he has what it takes to do that in a best of five setting, but it makes for some interesting intrigue. Waiting for him in the quarters should be David Ferrer, so Nadal has likely the most difficult quarterfinal match of the top four seeds. Grigor Dimitrov is in this part of the draw as well, but he's got a tricky road that he just won't be able to maneuver. Ivo Karlovic is probably the worst first round opponent a person can draw for a non-seed, so he had that misfortune, and Ferrer is simply a bull on clay that he's not quite going to be able to take down, should he make it that far. No upsets here, Nadal comes through.
The Stanimal's Quarter:
Stanislas Wawrinka has followed up his incredible Australian Open run with a very lackluster set of results. Historically a very good clay court player, Stan did not have a good spring on the dirt, and he draws a tough quarter, one I don't think he makes it through. It's always tough to play a Spaniard in the first round, and Garcia-Lopez is no slouch on clay. He could have another Spaniard in Feliciano Lopez followed by a very difficult fourth round match. The match I am looking forward to is a potential third round clash between Gael Monfils and the enigma that is Fabio Fognini, probably the most hated player on tour. The two played an incredible match several years back that went five sets and was mired in a little bit of controversy. In what may have been the match ending the latest ever at the French Open, Fognini clamored for play to be halted in the fifth set. Monfils wanted to continue on, and eventually the match was suspended at 5-5 in the fifth due to lack of light. Fognini ended up claiming the match 9-7 the following day. He followed this up in 2011 with a controversial win in which he was accused of inappropriately getting treatment for cramps. Barely able to move, he pulled out the victory and received a chorus of boos after the match. He withdrew from the quarterfinals due to injury in what may have been a more political than physical move. Needless to say, the huge fan favorite Monfils will be taking on the villain Fognini. I really felt like Monfils could make a huge run here; he always plays his absolute best in front of the home crowd, as he loves the attention of the grand stage and the home crowd. His ankle and his fitness are a question mark, though. He was in good form early in the year, but is a not 100% Monfils able to take on the likes of people like Fognini and Wawrinka? Probably not, but what fun are predictions if you don't call a few upsets? The bottom of the quarter feature a slew of clay courters, the unfulfilled promise of Richard Gasquet, and Andy Murray, who has not been the same since his back surgery. As far as I'm concerned, this eighth of the draw is wide open, with Kohlschreiber having as good a chance as any to escape. Coming off a clay court title last week, he could carry that momentum into the French. This is a strange quarter in that there's a ton of talent but a real lack of results for the group on clay in 2014. This is as wide open as it gets, and I'm just going to go with Monfils as a fun pick to advance. He looked okay in his dance off, after all.
Federer's Quarter:
The draw gods were smiling on Federer this year. You don't get a much easier draw than the one he had. The only person that could even trouble him before the quarterfinals is a firing on all cylinders Ernests Gulbis. On the top half, you have Tomas Berdych as the highest seed, certainly a very capable clay court player. The Robredo is a very intriguing player in this portion of the draw. Age seems to not play a role in his ability. Truly a great competitor, he's capable of beating anyone in the quarter. Roberto Bautista Agut is another guy who could muddy the waters in this quarter, but I don't see it happening. Ultimately, I like Federer to come through this quarter with a victory over Berdych in the quarters, although it wouldn't at all surprise me to see Robredo make a quarterfinal run and even beat Federer, as he did last year at the US Open.
Novak's Quarter:
Fresh off of a victory in Rome over Nadal, Djokovic will be tested in this tournament. Let's see, clay courters in the first two rounds, constant under-achieving yet still dangerous Marin Cilic potentially in the third round, Tsonga on home turf who can beat anybody on any given day potentially in the fourth round, and his quarterfinal match is a bit of a question mark. I don't like Raonic's chances here. I think Gilles Simon knocks him off in the third round. Were Kei Nishikori 100% healthy, I'd certainly pick him, hands down, to be Djokovic's quarterfinal opponent, and while I still think he has a shot, I am not so confident in his health to hold up over the course of some potentially grueling matches against guys who will make him work. I like Simon to make a run to the quarters before he ultimately bows out to Djokovic.
In the semis, Rafa should easily dismiss my fun underdog in Monfils, and a semifinal between Federer and Djokovic should prove a bit more competitive. I see Federer jumping out to an early lead before his level of play falling like he is very prone to, and Novak wins in four sets. In the finals, we have another "epic" match between two players who commit a time violation between every single point. It's not that I don't enjoy their matches, but over the course of five sets, you can only tolerate so much ball bouncing, shorts adjusting, hair touching activity and long baseline rallies with relatively few winners before it grows a little stale. Previously I had calculated if you took all the time the two spend above the time violation mark over the course of their five set French Open final, it added about another hour to the total match time. That's a lot of wasted time. But I digress, these two will battle it out, and I think that this time, someone finally solves Nadal in a French Open final, giving Djokovic a career Slam of his own. Now there's nothing left to do but to sit back, watch some tennis, and see all my predictions go wrong!
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Saturday, May 24, 2014
Surviving Solo
This is purely anecdotal, but society, we have a problem. Well, we have many problems, but socially we have a particular problem. There's a fear of being alone. It may make sense, but there's a distinction to make. Being lonely and being alone are not the same. One can be alone without being lonely, and actually one can be lonely without being alone with the type of social and emotional detachment that is possible even between people familiar with each other. In the smartphone age, everyone is connected. Everyone wants to be doing something with someone they know because they can and because it's comfortable. If no one's available, why do it? Or what you can do is go out but then spend the entire night on the phone online. The way I see it, it's a trend, and an alarming one at that. Now that I finally have a smartphone, I can't claim to be completely immune to that all of the time, but I feel I at least do better than many, partly due to mentality and partly due to lack of a smartphone until last year.
What's happening is we are cultivating a society that is not independent. I would venture to say that there are a lot of "independent" folks out there that really don't fit that definition. A key characteristic that I see is that people intertwining being lonely and being alone. "I can't be alone, or else I will be lonely", or something to that degree. That sort of mentality can be very counterproductive. In the past several months I have seen people either ask if others would go to a concert alone, or I have seen people stay in rather than go out due to lack of a person to go out with. Here's the thing: I am a timid person. I have some anxiety issues. When I struggled with them more, I used to get sick to my stomach going down the stairs from the apartment out to the car about going to a show where I didn't know anyone. And you know what? I forced myself to do it anyway, and more often than not, it worked out great. Even when it didn't work out great, it worked out well enough. I can count on one hand the number of times I have gone out alone and felt as though I would have been happier staying in. The more I did it, the easier it became. I don't know that it ever becomes truly easy, but it transforms from a production to a minor trifle. It seems fewer people are willing to do that, even amongst the "social" people.
The mentality is that people want a wingman/wingwoman. They want the safety net, the reassurance that they can go out, mingle, and if things go wrong, they have a person in the back pocket to tend to their wounded egos. And why not? Everyone likes a safety net, or at least most people. It becomes a crutch, though, and it leads us to a situation where people are unwilling to take risks. Being solo results in one of two things, being alone the entire night, or meeting new people. In the case of the former, if you are doing something you enjoy, being alone shouldn't be a problem anyhow. For the latter, even if you are not social, meeting people is partially out of your control because others can initiate contact with you. In many circumstances, that is the case with me. I will go to a show, keep to myself, and inevitably someone will begin talking to me. Once there's that icebreaker, I am fine. As it happens more and more often, then you become able to do the initiating. It's a very beneficial exercise. The biggest example in my life was travelling overseas by myself. It's a little intimidating to think about going to a place with a language you cannot speak and not knowing anyone, but that's what being independent and adventurous is all about. Had I gone with a pal, it's very likely I would not have forged all of the friendships in Europe that I did. Instead of turning to my right to talk to a friend, I turned to my left and talked to a stranger. And it worked out.
But why is this important? Who cares if people are able to go out alone and be content? Well, here's my concern. People are already susceptible to herd mentality. With the advent of technology, it provides an even greater opportunity for that when there is a reluctance to be alone, to do something independently of a familiar crowd. Herd mentality is obviously dangerous. Are people with social herd mentality more prone to herd mentality in sociopolitical and economic issues? I don't know, maybe. But that aside, herd mentality stifles creativity and creates a more homogenous society. I don't want to live in a boring world. I don't think that's going to happen in my lifetime. Even if it did, I think I'd be okay due to the fact that I can be alone and do things I like and be content with it (not always, but often enough).
So here's what I'd encourage. Try and go outside of your comfort zone. When you're at a bar or venue or wherever, and you're alone, don't reach for the phone. Don't just exist in a bar and scroll through your Facebook feed or send a "pay attention to me" text to 30 friends hoping you get a few responses. Talk to someone, or wait for someone to talk to you. Exist within your own thoughts, your own universe. Think about what made you go to that place and why you enjoy it, not that you're there without people you know. Earlier I mentioned that if you are doing something you enjoy, it shouldn't matter if you are alone. On the flip side, if you require other people to do an activity (and not something that literally requires multiple people to do), how much do you really enjoy it? If you find you're not enjoying yourself, that you cannot enjoy yourself, perhaps you don't like what you are doing as much as you think you do. Maybe it is something that is made much more enjoyable by company, and that's fine, but maybe not; take a moment to stop and think about it. It's a good opportunity to be introspective. There is no such thing as failure provided you learn something from an experience, so I encourage everyone to take the opportunity to learn.
What's happening is we are cultivating a society that is not independent. I would venture to say that there are a lot of "independent" folks out there that really don't fit that definition. A key characteristic that I see is that people intertwining being lonely and being alone. "I can't be alone, or else I will be lonely", or something to that degree. That sort of mentality can be very counterproductive. In the past several months I have seen people either ask if others would go to a concert alone, or I have seen people stay in rather than go out due to lack of a person to go out with. Here's the thing: I am a timid person. I have some anxiety issues. When I struggled with them more, I used to get sick to my stomach going down the stairs from the apartment out to the car about going to a show where I didn't know anyone. And you know what? I forced myself to do it anyway, and more often than not, it worked out great. Even when it didn't work out great, it worked out well enough. I can count on one hand the number of times I have gone out alone and felt as though I would have been happier staying in. The more I did it, the easier it became. I don't know that it ever becomes truly easy, but it transforms from a production to a minor trifle. It seems fewer people are willing to do that, even amongst the "social" people.
The mentality is that people want a wingman/wingwoman. They want the safety net, the reassurance that they can go out, mingle, and if things go wrong, they have a person in the back pocket to tend to their wounded egos. And why not? Everyone likes a safety net, or at least most people. It becomes a crutch, though, and it leads us to a situation where people are unwilling to take risks. Being solo results in one of two things, being alone the entire night, or meeting new people. In the case of the former, if you are doing something you enjoy, being alone shouldn't be a problem anyhow. For the latter, even if you are not social, meeting people is partially out of your control because others can initiate contact with you. In many circumstances, that is the case with me. I will go to a show, keep to myself, and inevitably someone will begin talking to me. Once there's that icebreaker, I am fine. As it happens more and more often, then you become able to do the initiating. It's a very beneficial exercise. The biggest example in my life was travelling overseas by myself. It's a little intimidating to think about going to a place with a language you cannot speak and not knowing anyone, but that's what being independent and adventurous is all about. Had I gone with a pal, it's very likely I would not have forged all of the friendships in Europe that I did. Instead of turning to my right to talk to a friend, I turned to my left and talked to a stranger. And it worked out.
But why is this important? Who cares if people are able to go out alone and be content? Well, here's my concern. People are already susceptible to herd mentality. With the advent of technology, it provides an even greater opportunity for that when there is a reluctance to be alone, to do something independently of a familiar crowd. Herd mentality is obviously dangerous. Are people with social herd mentality more prone to herd mentality in sociopolitical and economic issues? I don't know, maybe. But that aside, herd mentality stifles creativity and creates a more homogenous society. I don't want to live in a boring world. I don't think that's going to happen in my lifetime. Even if it did, I think I'd be okay due to the fact that I can be alone and do things I like and be content with it (not always, but often enough).
So here's what I'd encourage. Try and go outside of your comfort zone. When you're at a bar or venue or wherever, and you're alone, don't reach for the phone. Don't just exist in a bar and scroll through your Facebook feed or send a "pay attention to me" text to 30 friends hoping you get a few responses. Talk to someone, or wait for someone to talk to you. Exist within your own thoughts, your own universe. Think about what made you go to that place and why you enjoy it, not that you're there without people you know. Earlier I mentioned that if you are doing something you enjoy, it shouldn't matter if you are alone. On the flip side, if you require other people to do an activity (and not something that literally requires multiple people to do), how much do you really enjoy it? If you find you're not enjoying yourself, that you cannot enjoy yourself, perhaps you don't like what you are doing as much as you think you do. Maybe it is something that is made much more enjoyable by company, and that's fine, but maybe not; take a moment to stop and think about it. It's a good opportunity to be introspective. There is no such thing as failure provided you learn something from an experience, so I encourage everyone to take the opportunity to learn.
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
Men's Tennis: Greatest of All Time Debate
One of the often discussed/argued sports topics of discussion revolve around which player is the greatest to ever play a particular sport. First off, I want to remove one group of participants from the discussion. There are those who state there is no point in discussing the greatest player of all time. You can't ever compare players across eras, and we'll never have a definitive answer on who is best. That's 100% correct, but who cares? Part of the beauty of sports is not the sporting events themselves, but the discussion surrounding them. We'll never know how Babe Ruth would hit against Randy Johnson. We'll never know how Wilt Chamberlain would fare in today's hyper athletic NBA. Part of the fun is speculating, taking relevant facts and tidbits into consideration, and making an assertion that others can support or refute. No, we'll never know the actual truth, but it's fun to discuss it, so that's just what I am going to do.
With Roger Federer's reign of supreme dominance in the mid 2000s, the talk of tennis greatest of all time appeared it was going to be an easier and easier argument to make. Roger was less man and more machine in those days, easily dismissing the players he faced in nearly every match, making many look foolish in the process. "The Maestro", as he was called for his beautiful precision game and graceful movement on court, is largely responsible for the elevation of the sport; his reign of supremacy forced oncoming players to elevate their levels of play, and yet Federer always seemed to have a switch he could flip to take his game to a level no one else possessed. Or no one until a man named Rafael Nadal came around, at least. Rafa was the first of a number of supremely talented and driven young guns ready to burst onto the scene, followed shortly thereafter by Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray. These three men have significantly muddied the waters in the greatest of all time discussion, not necessarily staking a claim for themselves yet, quite so early in their careers, but due to their results against Federer. Nadal is the obvious one, as he has by and large owned Federer due to a game that is Roger's kryptonite, a stubbornness by Federer to change his style of play early on in the rivalry when Nadal's game was far less developed and well rounded than it is today, and a preponderance of matches on clay, where it is very difficult to argue against Rafa for being the greatest of all time on that surface.
So let's take a step back from these four men and talk about the argument of the GOAT as a whole. What makes someone the greatest? Is it purely in the numbers? If so, which numbers? Total titles? Major titles? Wins overall? Is it measured by dominance over the field? Weeks at number one in the world? Does one have to excel on all surfaces? Is it better to have a short term level of supreme success or a long term level of great success? These are all questions that people have varying opinions on, which inevitably lead to differences in opinion on who is the greatest of all time. What also muddies the water is crossing of eras, as is the case in all sports. Tennis went from a game that was played with wooden racquets entirely on grass courts to one with graphite racquets, all sorts of new string technology, and a myriad of court surfaces including multiple types of clay, multiple types of hard, grass, and previously even carpet, and surfaces are found both indoors and outdoors. The game is also more globalized than ever, with players coming out of more and more countries than ever before. The game evolved from on where the goal was to try and move forward towards the net more often than not to one where players rarely stray from the baseline due to the evolution of racquet technology. Tennis is perhaps one of the harder sports to compare across eras because of the technology changes, surface changes, and the fact that it is an individual sport with one on one matches and ever fluctuating levels of competition.
So who are the names that regularly find their way into the discussion? Well, there are more than I am going to list, but the main culprits that seem to come up repeatedly are Rod Laver, Bjorn Borg, Pete Sampras, Roger Federer, and Rafael Nadal is creeping in on the discussion as well.
Laver has won two calendar year Grand Slams, an unmatched feat. He is considered by many, not all, to be the best player of his time. What makes evaluating this hard is he played both before and after the Open Era and at a time when tennis was mixed between amateur and professional ranks, complicating matters on participation in tournaments. Tournaments had fewer matches and not nearly the same level of competition back then, and in my personal opinion, I don't see how he makes the cut due to these facts.
Bjorn Borg was as relentless as of a competitor as they came. His superior athleticism and grit won him a total of 11 Grand Slam events, all at the French Open and Wimbledon. Borg retired young at the age of 26 due to burnout (more mental than physical, although he lived a fast lifestyle), and he often didn't make the trip down to Australia for the Australian Open (as was common in his time). Borg is statistically the most dominant Grand Slam player in terms of winning percentage, and had he played a longer career and more events, he certainly would have had several more titles to his name. He was a baseline player in a time when there were not really baseline players, and this alone makes him a very compelling argument that he was a revolutionary talent and very well could be the greatest to ever play. How much does he get knocked for not having a lengthy career to continue to amass titles, though?
Pete Sampras, before Roger Federer came along, was the leader in Grand Slam titles, and probably the single most dominant force Wimbledon has ever seen. His weeks spent ranked number one and his overall number of Grand Slam titles cemented him as the greatest in the eyes of many. Sampras really had no rivals that were largely successful against him, either. He's got probably the greatest second serve of all time, and he probably could have continued his success had he abandoned his 85 sq. inch racquet when the rest of the tour went to 90-100 sq. inch racquets (many players never elect to make a big transition in racquets like this due to the difficulty). The argument against him is that he was not a great player on clay, and he never had good success at the French Open. To be lacking in one area of the game when there are other well rounded players at similar levels of greatness diminish his standing a bit. Additionally, with Federer stealing away a number of his records, including Grand Slam titles, and Nadal poised to tie and then overtake the Grand Slam mark himself, his biggest arguing point is gone.
Moving forward to the current era, Roger Federer is now considered by many to be the greatest ever. The reasons listed at the opening of the analysis only partially tell the story. When looking at the list of records and marks Federer holds, it's dumbfounding. If not the greatest of all time, he is certainly the most consistently great of all time. His marks of consecutive finals, semifinals, and quarterfinals in Grand Slam events demonstrate a remarkable run of simply not ever having a bad day. All great players have that bad day where they lose to someone they'd beat 19 times out of 20, but for years in the events that mattered most, Federer didn't. The semifinals mark in particular is one I simply cannot imagine falling. The knock on Federer is twofold: he dominated during a "weak" era of competition, and how can you be the greatest ever when your main rival owned you? First of all, the notion that he dominated a weak era is a bit unfair. The game is more global than ever before and is deeper than ever before, making it more likely to get knocked out in the earlier rounds, something Federer rarely ever did. I also don't think that gives players like Hewitt, Roddick, and Safin, among others, their due. When you look at some of the players Federer toppled en route to a Grand Slam title and compare to some of the people Sampras knocked off, there are many cases where Sampras probably had an easier path. Certainly, the accomplishments of Nadal and Djokovic winning their titles over the past few years are more impressive a task, as there is a glut of top end talent in the years around the turn of the decade.
As for Nadal's dominance of Federer, that one becomes harder and harder for me to dismiss. I initially stood by there not being any shame in the lopsided record against the greatest of all time on clay, and it's not Roger's fault Rafa couldn't advance to hard court finals earlier in his career when Fed would always be waiting for him. That only carries so much merit, though. What really stands out in my mind is that Federer was always perceived as a supreme mental player, and Nadal single handedly ruined that. Not only did Federer lose his edge, but it became a weakness. When you look at the leads he has blown, the break point opportunities missed, the inexplicable errors, and a stubborn determination to not change his game in order to try and prove no one could beat him from the baseline, it really is staggering to think how many more titles he could have. Had he pulled out that epic five setter in Rome, maybe the entire fabric of tennis is different. Maybe his confidence has that extra little boost he needed to not crumble under pressure. But that didn't happen, and when you compare Federer's record against Nadal, a lopsided record, Murray, a slight edge to Murray and one that figures to grow as Federer ages, and Djokovic, a slight edge to Federer with Djokovic in his prime and Federer in the twilight of his career, the head to head numbers really don't suggest Federer being as dominant as his overall numbers. Now, I want to say, this is extremely harsh nitpicking. Anyone who denies Federer's greatness is either bitter or delusional. Still, these results leave just enough doubt to make someone hesitant crowning him the all time greatest.
Finally, and the jury is still largely out on him, is Rafael Nadal. Nadal is no slouch with 13 Grand Slam titles, can claim to be the greatest of all time on clay, and also has multiple Slams on both grass and hard courts. Easily one of the fiercest competitors of all time, the question with him has never been the results, but the health. Having already missed significant time due to injury, the question is how many more titles does he realistically have in him with Djokovic being a top rival now, Murray coming into his own (or at least he was before his back surgery), and some of the next wave of young talent starting to figure things out and making their way towards and into the top 10. Suppose he cannot stay healthy, though, look at where he ends up even today! All the Grand Slams, the myriad of Masters Series titles, well more than Federer. His greatness started at a much younger age, and despite playing second fiddle to Federer for years, his stranglehold over their head to head careers gives him a little bit of a boost in his all time standing. Do his career accolades, when you dig deeper into the list, stack up against Federer's? Maybe not in all categories, but when you look at his winning percentages, his titles, and his all surface game that he never quite gets enough credit for, he's at least within shouting distance. As of right now, I don't think he quite gets the nod to be the greatest of all time. I do think, however, that he still has at least a couple of more Slams in him and some more fight in him yet; the man has never stopped finding ways to improve his game. He used to be a purely relentless defensive baseline player. No serve, no net game, just ridiculous range and a loopy topspin forehand. Now his serve is respectable, he is solid at net, can play a more offensive style game, and he's still as fit and relentless as ever. I think he is the type of player that can reinvent himself to suit his declining physical abilities to add some additional longevity to his career.
So, did I leave the picture hazy enough for everyone? I didn't even mention a lot of others who could be thrown in the mix, either. Now, I did say that part of the fun is going out and making a case for one person. I don't want to back off of that. My feeling is I really have to give it to Federer at this point, with the sense that Nadal will overtake him in the coming years, and that Borg probably would hold the spot had he continued his career. Feel free to make a case for someone else; I am all ears!
With Roger Federer's reign of supreme dominance in the mid 2000s, the talk of tennis greatest of all time appeared it was going to be an easier and easier argument to make. Roger was less man and more machine in those days, easily dismissing the players he faced in nearly every match, making many look foolish in the process. "The Maestro", as he was called for his beautiful precision game and graceful movement on court, is largely responsible for the elevation of the sport; his reign of supremacy forced oncoming players to elevate their levels of play, and yet Federer always seemed to have a switch he could flip to take his game to a level no one else possessed. Or no one until a man named Rafael Nadal came around, at least. Rafa was the first of a number of supremely talented and driven young guns ready to burst onto the scene, followed shortly thereafter by Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray. These three men have significantly muddied the waters in the greatest of all time discussion, not necessarily staking a claim for themselves yet, quite so early in their careers, but due to their results against Federer. Nadal is the obvious one, as he has by and large owned Federer due to a game that is Roger's kryptonite, a stubbornness by Federer to change his style of play early on in the rivalry when Nadal's game was far less developed and well rounded than it is today, and a preponderance of matches on clay, where it is very difficult to argue against Rafa for being the greatest of all time on that surface.
So let's take a step back from these four men and talk about the argument of the GOAT as a whole. What makes someone the greatest? Is it purely in the numbers? If so, which numbers? Total titles? Major titles? Wins overall? Is it measured by dominance over the field? Weeks at number one in the world? Does one have to excel on all surfaces? Is it better to have a short term level of supreme success or a long term level of great success? These are all questions that people have varying opinions on, which inevitably lead to differences in opinion on who is the greatest of all time. What also muddies the water is crossing of eras, as is the case in all sports. Tennis went from a game that was played with wooden racquets entirely on grass courts to one with graphite racquets, all sorts of new string technology, and a myriad of court surfaces including multiple types of clay, multiple types of hard, grass, and previously even carpet, and surfaces are found both indoors and outdoors. The game is also more globalized than ever, with players coming out of more and more countries than ever before. The game evolved from on where the goal was to try and move forward towards the net more often than not to one where players rarely stray from the baseline due to the evolution of racquet technology. Tennis is perhaps one of the harder sports to compare across eras because of the technology changes, surface changes, and the fact that it is an individual sport with one on one matches and ever fluctuating levels of competition.
So who are the names that regularly find their way into the discussion? Well, there are more than I am going to list, but the main culprits that seem to come up repeatedly are Rod Laver, Bjorn Borg, Pete Sampras, Roger Federer, and Rafael Nadal is creeping in on the discussion as well.
Laver has won two calendar year Grand Slams, an unmatched feat. He is considered by many, not all, to be the best player of his time. What makes evaluating this hard is he played both before and after the Open Era and at a time when tennis was mixed between amateur and professional ranks, complicating matters on participation in tournaments. Tournaments had fewer matches and not nearly the same level of competition back then, and in my personal opinion, I don't see how he makes the cut due to these facts.
Bjorn Borg was as relentless as of a competitor as they came. His superior athleticism and grit won him a total of 11 Grand Slam events, all at the French Open and Wimbledon. Borg retired young at the age of 26 due to burnout (more mental than physical, although he lived a fast lifestyle), and he often didn't make the trip down to Australia for the Australian Open (as was common in his time). Borg is statistically the most dominant Grand Slam player in terms of winning percentage, and had he played a longer career and more events, he certainly would have had several more titles to his name. He was a baseline player in a time when there were not really baseline players, and this alone makes him a very compelling argument that he was a revolutionary talent and very well could be the greatest to ever play. How much does he get knocked for not having a lengthy career to continue to amass titles, though?
Pete Sampras, before Roger Federer came along, was the leader in Grand Slam titles, and probably the single most dominant force Wimbledon has ever seen. His weeks spent ranked number one and his overall number of Grand Slam titles cemented him as the greatest in the eyes of many. Sampras really had no rivals that were largely successful against him, either. He's got probably the greatest second serve of all time, and he probably could have continued his success had he abandoned his 85 sq. inch racquet when the rest of the tour went to 90-100 sq. inch racquets (many players never elect to make a big transition in racquets like this due to the difficulty). The argument against him is that he was not a great player on clay, and he never had good success at the French Open. To be lacking in one area of the game when there are other well rounded players at similar levels of greatness diminish his standing a bit. Additionally, with Federer stealing away a number of his records, including Grand Slam titles, and Nadal poised to tie and then overtake the Grand Slam mark himself, his biggest arguing point is gone.
Moving forward to the current era, Roger Federer is now considered by many to be the greatest ever. The reasons listed at the opening of the analysis only partially tell the story. When looking at the list of records and marks Federer holds, it's dumbfounding. If not the greatest of all time, he is certainly the most consistently great of all time. His marks of consecutive finals, semifinals, and quarterfinals in Grand Slam events demonstrate a remarkable run of simply not ever having a bad day. All great players have that bad day where they lose to someone they'd beat 19 times out of 20, but for years in the events that mattered most, Federer didn't. The semifinals mark in particular is one I simply cannot imagine falling. The knock on Federer is twofold: he dominated during a "weak" era of competition, and how can you be the greatest ever when your main rival owned you? First of all, the notion that he dominated a weak era is a bit unfair. The game is more global than ever before and is deeper than ever before, making it more likely to get knocked out in the earlier rounds, something Federer rarely ever did. I also don't think that gives players like Hewitt, Roddick, and Safin, among others, their due. When you look at some of the players Federer toppled en route to a Grand Slam title and compare to some of the people Sampras knocked off, there are many cases where Sampras probably had an easier path. Certainly, the accomplishments of Nadal and Djokovic winning their titles over the past few years are more impressive a task, as there is a glut of top end talent in the years around the turn of the decade.
As for Nadal's dominance of Federer, that one becomes harder and harder for me to dismiss. I initially stood by there not being any shame in the lopsided record against the greatest of all time on clay, and it's not Roger's fault Rafa couldn't advance to hard court finals earlier in his career when Fed would always be waiting for him. That only carries so much merit, though. What really stands out in my mind is that Federer was always perceived as a supreme mental player, and Nadal single handedly ruined that. Not only did Federer lose his edge, but it became a weakness. When you look at the leads he has blown, the break point opportunities missed, the inexplicable errors, and a stubborn determination to not change his game in order to try and prove no one could beat him from the baseline, it really is staggering to think how many more titles he could have. Had he pulled out that epic five setter in Rome, maybe the entire fabric of tennis is different. Maybe his confidence has that extra little boost he needed to not crumble under pressure. But that didn't happen, and when you compare Federer's record against Nadal, a lopsided record, Murray, a slight edge to Murray and one that figures to grow as Federer ages, and Djokovic, a slight edge to Federer with Djokovic in his prime and Federer in the twilight of his career, the head to head numbers really don't suggest Federer being as dominant as his overall numbers. Now, I want to say, this is extremely harsh nitpicking. Anyone who denies Federer's greatness is either bitter or delusional. Still, these results leave just enough doubt to make someone hesitant crowning him the all time greatest.
Finally, and the jury is still largely out on him, is Rafael Nadal. Nadal is no slouch with 13 Grand Slam titles, can claim to be the greatest of all time on clay, and also has multiple Slams on both grass and hard courts. Easily one of the fiercest competitors of all time, the question with him has never been the results, but the health. Having already missed significant time due to injury, the question is how many more titles does he realistically have in him with Djokovic being a top rival now, Murray coming into his own (or at least he was before his back surgery), and some of the next wave of young talent starting to figure things out and making their way towards and into the top 10. Suppose he cannot stay healthy, though, look at where he ends up even today! All the Grand Slams, the myriad of Masters Series titles, well more than Federer. His greatness started at a much younger age, and despite playing second fiddle to Federer for years, his stranglehold over their head to head careers gives him a little bit of a boost in his all time standing. Do his career accolades, when you dig deeper into the list, stack up against Federer's? Maybe not in all categories, but when you look at his winning percentages, his titles, and his all surface game that he never quite gets enough credit for, he's at least within shouting distance. As of right now, I don't think he quite gets the nod to be the greatest of all time. I do think, however, that he still has at least a couple of more Slams in him and some more fight in him yet; the man has never stopped finding ways to improve his game. He used to be a purely relentless defensive baseline player. No serve, no net game, just ridiculous range and a loopy topspin forehand. Now his serve is respectable, he is solid at net, can play a more offensive style game, and he's still as fit and relentless as ever. I think he is the type of player that can reinvent himself to suit his declining physical abilities to add some additional longevity to his career.
So, did I leave the picture hazy enough for everyone? I didn't even mention a lot of others who could be thrown in the mix, either. Now, I did say that part of the fun is going out and making a case for one person. I don't want to back off of that. My feeling is I really have to give it to Federer at this point, with the sense that Nadal will overtake him in the coming years, and that Borg probably would hold the spot had he continued his career. Feel free to make a case for someone else; I am all ears!
Monday, May 19, 2014
Escaping Malice
Most people will tell you that, after spending about 15 minutes with me, I am a genuinely nice guy. Whatever that means, anyhow. It's a reasonable assessment. I put others before myself, I try very hard to do the right thing, I have a very strong conscience and sense of responsibility to hold myself to a higher standard, I really try to go the extra mile to show people I care, and I enjoy random acts of kindness. People tell me I am a good guy, a good man. Here's the thing: I'm not a good man, I work to be a good man. People think that it's something innate, that I was just graced from the heavens with the "nice gene". It isn't that people take it for granted - people appreciate the things I do and the way I act, they really, really do. What I think goes lost is that it's really difficult to be that guy, to fill that role all the time. It's part of me, it's who I want to be, how I want to act, and how I want to be remembered - to be a gentleman in a world gradually forgetting what that means, to turn the other cheek no matter how badly it stings, and to rise above the destructive emotions we all feel as humans.
The problem is, there are times where it is difficult to be this way, and when you've been this way so long, when it's part of your identity, even when you may not want to, you have to. And it's painful - it's really painful. It's a catch-22: if you remain resolute, your emotions overcome you. You become so angry you want to vomit. You curse what/who you're mad at, but more importantly, you curse yourself for being the way you are, because you have emotions you can never act on. It's a remarkable display of both strength and helplessness at the same time. Yet if you act the other way, you let yourself down. It's the old "I'm not mad, I'm disappointed" line, and that line always makes you feel so much worse. You understand lashing out. It's normal. It's human. And it's still sinking to a lower level, one that you'd like to hope you're above. It becomes a very dangerous occurrence when the act of being human, being innately imperfect, becomes one that breeds self-resentment. I know the feeling, know it all too well. Why cut myself a break? It shouldn't matter that it's normal; don't you want to be better than normal?
Over the years, it's been something that hasn't always been easy, but I always managed to bounce back from. Lately, though, it's become much more difficult. I don't know if it's due to more stress in a shorter period of time than I've experienced, the experience of dealing with some particularly spiteful, malevolent, negative people, or just that one can only sustain the pressure of holding one's self to a higher, probably entirely unrealistic, standard for so long. In any case, it has changed my behavior. Some might not see it, in fact, many may not see it, but it has. More than anything, I've become more blunt and more prone to speaking without a filter. On the whole, it doesn't matter too much to people, as when I more generally have positive things to say and mostly surround myself with people whom I respect and admire, and whose outlooks are open-minded and whose attitudes are respectful, candor tends not to upset people too much. Sometimes a sensitive person or a sensitive situation will turn a statement or position with no ill intent into one that is hurtful. But there are times where deep down you wish ill intent, not out of some evil desire to harm someone, but because you've been wronged. Not that you feel you've been wronged, but when you truly have been wronged, when you've been treated in an entirely unfair manner that was completely undeserved. These are the times when on the scale of mercy to justice, you're Batman telling Gandhi to get the hell out of your way. It's not a unique circumstance, but at the end of the day, we still have a choice. We always have a choice.
What can happen when anger and resentment consume you is that you become blinded to what makes you feel good. Revenge might feel good temporarily, but it doesn't accomplish anything, truly. I'm not even trying to portray vengeance in a negative manner, rather, it's like an annual flower. It's great, but it dies in a year. Instead, there's the option for a perennial. We lose sight of this at times, but sometimes we can do a better job of looking for those perennials, and sometimes they come to us. The flower is no less pretty, and it has a longer lasting positive impact in the end. I had one such example today, and when it happened, it took me aback a little bit. I was fuming, conceding myself to malice and contempt and thinking about how continuing to harbor that emotion is worth it in order to harness it and return the spite and venom back to the original source, both to give some gratification and to teach a lesson: you reap what you sow. But then something happened: I had an opportunity present itself to do something nice for another person, and I took advantage of it. In a matter of seconds, all of the bitterness and frustration completely dissolved. I have been reinforcing to myself that I have to focus on the positive people in my life and remove those who don't fit that bill. Doing something good for those who deserve it is infinitely more productive the doing something bad to those who deserve it. That good deed done for no particular reason can only serve to make a positive difference in someone's life. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. It's not going to be destructive, though, which is all you accomplish by fighting back in anger and frustrations. The thought that it will "teach someone a lesson" is pretty misguided; change comes from within, so the likelihood that retaliation, a negative action, is going to inspire someone making a positive change, is slim. It's not impossible, but I'd say it's far more likely to create more harm than good.
So there you have it. I sit here, writing this, feeling so much happier and more at peace than I could have in the other alternate scenario where I did something that ultimately would have made me feel disappointed in myself later on. Learning that surrounding myself with good people is more important than surrounding myself with people with the most common interests has been a long process for me. Seeing the good in people and overlooking their flaws is a good quality to have, but it's one that needs to be utilized with caution, as there are times when giving someone the benefit of the doubt is worthwhile, and there are times where discretion should dictate that it is better to just move along. I really look forward to conscientiously putting this into practice in my life and hopefully reaping the benefits of this slightly different philosophy. I'd like to think that there are people out there that have many common interests and are good people; you can't always have your cake and eat it too, but I'd like to think you can some of the time! All this said, I propose that the next time you have the inclination to seek retribution against someone else, take a step back, find someone else to appreciate, and reward that person with an act of kindness. See how it works out. I'd be willing to bet you'll be pleased with the outcome.
The problem is, there are times where it is difficult to be this way, and when you've been this way so long, when it's part of your identity, even when you may not want to, you have to. And it's painful - it's really painful. It's a catch-22: if you remain resolute, your emotions overcome you. You become so angry you want to vomit. You curse what/who you're mad at, but more importantly, you curse yourself for being the way you are, because you have emotions you can never act on. It's a remarkable display of both strength and helplessness at the same time. Yet if you act the other way, you let yourself down. It's the old "I'm not mad, I'm disappointed" line, and that line always makes you feel so much worse. You understand lashing out. It's normal. It's human. And it's still sinking to a lower level, one that you'd like to hope you're above. It becomes a very dangerous occurrence when the act of being human, being innately imperfect, becomes one that breeds self-resentment. I know the feeling, know it all too well. Why cut myself a break? It shouldn't matter that it's normal; don't you want to be better than normal?
Over the years, it's been something that hasn't always been easy, but I always managed to bounce back from. Lately, though, it's become much more difficult. I don't know if it's due to more stress in a shorter period of time than I've experienced, the experience of dealing with some particularly spiteful, malevolent, negative people, or just that one can only sustain the pressure of holding one's self to a higher, probably entirely unrealistic, standard for so long. In any case, it has changed my behavior. Some might not see it, in fact, many may not see it, but it has. More than anything, I've become more blunt and more prone to speaking without a filter. On the whole, it doesn't matter too much to people, as when I more generally have positive things to say and mostly surround myself with people whom I respect and admire, and whose outlooks are open-minded and whose attitudes are respectful, candor tends not to upset people too much. Sometimes a sensitive person or a sensitive situation will turn a statement or position with no ill intent into one that is hurtful. But there are times where deep down you wish ill intent, not out of some evil desire to harm someone, but because you've been wronged. Not that you feel you've been wronged, but when you truly have been wronged, when you've been treated in an entirely unfair manner that was completely undeserved. These are the times when on the scale of mercy to justice, you're Batman telling Gandhi to get the hell out of your way. It's not a unique circumstance, but at the end of the day, we still have a choice. We always have a choice.
What can happen when anger and resentment consume you is that you become blinded to what makes you feel good. Revenge might feel good temporarily, but it doesn't accomplish anything, truly. I'm not even trying to portray vengeance in a negative manner, rather, it's like an annual flower. It's great, but it dies in a year. Instead, there's the option for a perennial. We lose sight of this at times, but sometimes we can do a better job of looking for those perennials, and sometimes they come to us. The flower is no less pretty, and it has a longer lasting positive impact in the end. I had one such example today, and when it happened, it took me aback a little bit. I was fuming, conceding myself to malice and contempt and thinking about how continuing to harbor that emotion is worth it in order to harness it and return the spite and venom back to the original source, both to give some gratification and to teach a lesson: you reap what you sow. But then something happened: I had an opportunity present itself to do something nice for another person, and I took advantage of it. In a matter of seconds, all of the bitterness and frustration completely dissolved. I have been reinforcing to myself that I have to focus on the positive people in my life and remove those who don't fit that bill. Doing something good for those who deserve it is infinitely more productive the doing something bad to those who deserve it. That good deed done for no particular reason can only serve to make a positive difference in someone's life. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. It's not going to be destructive, though, which is all you accomplish by fighting back in anger and frustrations. The thought that it will "teach someone a lesson" is pretty misguided; change comes from within, so the likelihood that retaliation, a negative action, is going to inspire someone making a positive change, is slim. It's not impossible, but I'd say it's far more likely to create more harm than good.
So there you have it. I sit here, writing this, feeling so much happier and more at peace than I could have in the other alternate scenario where I did something that ultimately would have made me feel disappointed in myself later on. Learning that surrounding myself with good people is more important than surrounding myself with people with the most common interests has been a long process for me. Seeing the good in people and overlooking their flaws is a good quality to have, but it's one that needs to be utilized with caution, as there are times when giving someone the benefit of the doubt is worthwhile, and there are times where discretion should dictate that it is better to just move along. I really look forward to conscientiously putting this into practice in my life and hopefully reaping the benefits of this slightly different philosophy. I'd like to think that there are people out there that have many common interests and are good people; you can't always have your cake and eat it too, but I'd like to think you can some of the time! All this said, I propose that the next time you have the inclination to seek retribution against someone else, take a step back, find someone else to appreciate, and reward that person with an act of kindness. See how it works out. I'd be willing to bet you'll be pleased with the outcome.
Sunday, May 11, 2014
Hybrid Post - Approaching Normal
So in my prior post, I alluded to perhaps composing a separate entry as to why photography has been a particular topic of neglect on the blog. I'll get to that here with a bit of an exposition on the past few years of my life, how it's impacted me, and where I am headed. In the process, though, there's also a music tie to this, which I'll address first.
In a post last month, I mentioned that happiness is the journey, not the destination. I wasn't born with that knowledge, nor was it a sudden epiphany; it came over many years of both personal experience and hearing it externally. Hearing it or thinking about it is one thing, but truly believing it and hammering it into your stream of consciousness is another. Along this quest, there's a band that I have listened to quite bit, though not much in the past couple of years. That band is Blue October. Blue October isn't so much a band as it is a journal set to music and a haven for so many people who have, know someone, or can relate to mental illness. The lead singer, Justin Furstenfeld, is bipolar, and his songs deal with topics related to both his own struggles with and the general subject matters of mental illness, addiction, self-destructive behaviors, loneliness, and heartbreak. It doesn't stop there, though, as the flip side to it is song about recovery, goals, and moving on with life. About four years ago I reminded myself daily of my goal which came from a song of theirs off of the Consent to Treatment album, and that song was Independently Happy. For a while I had been either independent or happy, but not both at the same time. There was a lot of self-evaluation I needed to do, time that I needed to be even more introspective than normal. I forced myself to try and put priority on the right things, to find balance in my life.
For a while, it mostly worked. I never quite had a feeling of inner peace, but I was staying active, working on bettering myself, and forcing myself to focus on activities and events, not whom I could do them with. I opened up myself to a whole plethora of new experiences. At the time I still had my lows - I'd refer to my life at times as a gilded existence, as on the surface everything looked wonderful, but it was only a facade for the emptiness beneath the surface. There was still something I hadn't come to terms with yet, and it's ultimately what both kept me going full speed, which made life worthwhile, as well as made me crash, from which I am still sort of recovering from. That something was my profession. After high school, I took one year to get my AA, then I transferred schools with a declared math major. After one semester, I switched to economics, as I wanted something that was more application and less pure theory. It wasn't until my final semester that I had my Healthcare Economics class, at which point I really started to truly think about how I enjoyed what I studied, departing from my previous state of being burned out from school more so because I thought it was stupid, and it would be much quicker for an employer to simply teach me how to do a job without wasting several more years of my life (the signalling theory - college doesn't prepare you for your job, but the piece of paper is a method of signalling to an employer that you can go through the motions and graduate). At that point, I had already committed myself to the workforce after graduation, and due to a reluctance to relocate because of my long term relationship at that time, I landed in an industry I knew nothing about and cared little for. Insurance is not a bad industry, on the contrary, I think what I do is a lot better than many things I could be doing right now. But back then, all it served as was a job in an industry I didn't want to be a part of all because I made a decision based on a relationship that ended. Regardless of if I was upset about my job being miserable, and rest assured, there were periods of time when it was miserable, or just how I got there, it weighed on me.
Now here's where I suppose I'll really turn on the candor - no reason to stop now, right? Somewhere along the way my mentality changed. It went from wanting to improve my life by bettering myself in new ways, and using this as a "I may not like what I do for a living, but it enables me to do other things when I'm not working", to "I need to use these things to escape this hell I exist in 40-60 hours a week in". At that point, the things I did took on a different purpose. Initially I worked out because I enjoyed being healthy, and I wanted to have good fitness for playing tennis (or after experiencing knee troubles, just to be fit in general). I took up photography as a means to replace the hole left where tennis was. I enjoyed doing it at concerts and escaping into nature. I started dieting to try and better shape my physique. I decided to go to Europe and took up learning French. I also participated in making a movie as a fun project and learning experience. Then it all got twisted. The working out and dieting became extreme; I didn't necessarily do it because I enjoyed it, but because I had to to keep looking better. Someone had suggested I could go into modeling. Hey! Modeling is an escape from office work! All the while I could keep up with my photography. I know full well making money doing photography is more business than it is the quality of your photos, which is where I felt I had a leg up. And I was learning a lot about film, too.
"Surely I could throw all these things against the wall and see what sticks, right? Just do it all! Oh, and keep taking those exams at work; no use in stopping halfway through your certification, but hurry up, you have to finish quickly because the sooner you finish, the sooner you can sit out 12 months so you don't have to pay back any of the test fees. You've got to learn French by the time you go to Europe, hurry up! Besides, what if you want to live in Europe? You should be multi-lingual. Europe is better than the U.S., and it could make you forget about your job here..."
And that's how it went. It all became needing to use the things I did as a way out of the life I had convinced myself I hated instead of doing them for enjoyment. I'll acknowledge here that people can go out and change things should they set their minds to it. I am no different. In order to do so, though, it requires a tremendous deal of determination, and you have to be willing to take risks. I wasn't willing to take a risk; I wasn't going to quit my full time job that provided the standard of living I was accustomed to to try and dedicate myself completely and entirely to another pursuit. Instead, I just tried to do a little of everything and hope I got lucky...or at least that's what I told myself. By that time, who knows what my mind really wanted. The constant juggling, the pressure, the stress, eventually it all blew up in my face, and I am still today recovering from it several years later. A lot has happened in that period of time. I've definitely become wiser and more self aware, but there are still lingering impacts. You see, the series of events I just mentioned are why I now have an aversion to photography. My mind still today shies away from the things I did back then. I sparingly do photography, I end up throwing out spinach salad if I buy it because I cannot bring myself to eat it after eating it so much for that period of years. I haven't worked out in over two years. I've not resumed learning French (or even decided that it still makes sense to). And for a while, it upset me that I shy away from all these things. I've come to find, though, that it shouldn't. I'm still finding my way and learning about myself each day, and I know that the self-loathing, no matter how hard it may be to escape sometimes, is not healthy, and I am not going to do it anymore. I've resolved to it. If that means not pushing myself to do things before I am ready, so be it. I am confident that I will find the path that makes sense for me. I've been slow to do it, but it's going to happen. I can feel myself approaching normal.
Approaching Normal is the name of a Blue October album - it's probably the start of the decline in their musical quality (although the last album is more mellow and is a departure from the more raw sound of previous albums. I don't want to come across as a "they changed they sound" complainer; it's prior to this album that I felt their music started declining, not just that I didn't like the new sound as much), but there are definitely some good songs off of the album, ones that I, and many others, can relate to. It's the little things that I notice improving. Part of getting a new place has helped, as it's a fresh start, and I now I have a strong incentive to make the place nice. I'm back to immediately doing dishes after eating or spending extra time to put items away. I'm determined to not let myself fall into complacency with the upkeep of the unit, and in time I think that's going to translate more and more into other aspects of my behavior. A little confidence and motivation goes a long way. I know I have to get back to the point where I push myself more than I do now, and finding the balance between not pushing enough and pushing too much is going to be a delicate process, but I have more belief in myself to accomplish that than I have for a long time. With that, I'll end with a song that is actually off their latest album.
In a post last month, I mentioned that happiness is the journey, not the destination. I wasn't born with that knowledge, nor was it a sudden epiphany; it came over many years of both personal experience and hearing it externally. Hearing it or thinking about it is one thing, but truly believing it and hammering it into your stream of consciousness is another. Along this quest, there's a band that I have listened to quite bit, though not much in the past couple of years. That band is Blue October. Blue October isn't so much a band as it is a journal set to music and a haven for so many people who have, know someone, or can relate to mental illness. The lead singer, Justin Furstenfeld, is bipolar, and his songs deal with topics related to both his own struggles with and the general subject matters of mental illness, addiction, self-destructive behaviors, loneliness, and heartbreak. It doesn't stop there, though, as the flip side to it is song about recovery, goals, and moving on with life. About four years ago I reminded myself daily of my goal which came from a song of theirs off of the Consent to Treatment album, and that song was Independently Happy. For a while I had been either independent or happy, but not both at the same time. There was a lot of self-evaluation I needed to do, time that I needed to be even more introspective than normal. I forced myself to try and put priority on the right things, to find balance in my life.
For a while, it mostly worked. I never quite had a feeling of inner peace, but I was staying active, working on bettering myself, and forcing myself to focus on activities and events, not whom I could do them with. I opened up myself to a whole plethora of new experiences. At the time I still had my lows - I'd refer to my life at times as a gilded existence, as on the surface everything looked wonderful, but it was only a facade for the emptiness beneath the surface. There was still something I hadn't come to terms with yet, and it's ultimately what both kept me going full speed, which made life worthwhile, as well as made me crash, from which I am still sort of recovering from. That something was my profession. After high school, I took one year to get my AA, then I transferred schools with a declared math major. After one semester, I switched to economics, as I wanted something that was more application and less pure theory. It wasn't until my final semester that I had my Healthcare Economics class, at which point I really started to truly think about how I enjoyed what I studied, departing from my previous state of being burned out from school more so because I thought it was stupid, and it would be much quicker for an employer to simply teach me how to do a job without wasting several more years of my life (the signalling theory - college doesn't prepare you for your job, but the piece of paper is a method of signalling to an employer that you can go through the motions and graduate). At that point, I had already committed myself to the workforce after graduation, and due to a reluctance to relocate because of my long term relationship at that time, I landed in an industry I knew nothing about and cared little for. Insurance is not a bad industry, on the contrary, I think what I do is a lot better than many things I could be doing right now. But back then, all it served as was a job in an industry I didn't want to be a part of all because I made a decision based on a relationship that ended. Regardless of if I was upset about my job being miserable, and rest assured, there were periods of time when it was miserable, or just how I got there, it weighed on me.
Now here's where I suppose I'll really turn on the candor - no reason to stop now, right? Somewhere along the way my mentality changed. It went from wanting to improve my life by bettering myself in new ways, and using this as a "I may not like what I do for a living, but it enables me to do other things when I'm not working", to "I need to use these things to escape this hell I exist in 40-60 hours a week in". At that point, the things I did took on a different purpose. Initially I worked out because I enjoyed being healthy, and I wanted to have good fitness for playing tennis (or after experiencing knee troubles, just to be fit in general). I took up photography as a means to replace the hole left where tennis was. I enjoyed doing it at concerts and escaping into nature. I started dieting to try and better shape my physique. I decided to go to Europe and took up learning French. I also participated in making a movie as a fun project and learning experience. Then it all got twisted. The working out and dieting became extreme; I didn't necessarily do it because I enjoyed it, but because I had to to keep looking better. Someone had suggested I could go into modeling. Hey! Modeling is an escape from office work! All the while I could keep up with my photography. I know full well making money doing photography is more business than it is the quality of your photos, which is where I felt I had a leg up. And I was learning a lot about film, too.
"Surely I could throw all these things against the wall and see what sticks, right? Just do it all! Oh, and keep taking those exams at work; no use in stopping halfway through your certification, but hurry up, you have to finish quickly because the sooner you finish, the sooner you can sit out 12 months so you don't have to pay back any of the test fees. You've got to learn French by the time you go to Europe, hurry up! Besides, what if you want to live in Europe? You should be multi-lingual. Europe is better than the U.S., and it could make you forget about your job here..."
And that's how it went. It all became needing to use the things I did as a way out of the life I had convinced myself I hated instead of doing them for enjoyment. I'll acknowledge here that people can go out and change things should they set their minds to it. I am no different. In order to do so, though, it requires a tremendous deal of determination, and you have to be willing to take risks. I wasn't willing to take a risk; I wasn't going to quit my full time job that provided the standard of living I was accustomed to to try and dedicate myself completely and entirely to another pursuit. Instead, I just tried to do a little of everything and hope I got lucky...or at least that's what I told myself. By that time, who knows what my mind really wanted. The constant juggling, the pressure, the stress, eventually it all blew up in my face, and I am still today recovering from it several years later. A lot has happened in that period of time. I've definitely become wiser and more self aware, but there are still lingering impacts. You see, the series of events I just mentioned are why I now have an aversion to photography. My mind still today shies away from the things I did back then. I sparingly do photography, I end up throwing out spinach salad if I buy it because I cannot bring myself to eat it after eating it so much for that period of years. I haven't worked out in over two years. I've not resumed learning French (or even decided that it still makes sense to). And for a while, it upset me that I shy away from all these things. I've come to find, though, that it shouldn't. I'm still finding my way and learning about myself each day, and I know that the self-loathing, no matter how hard it may be to escape sometimes, is not healthy, and I am not going to do it anymore. I've resolved to it. If that means not pushing myself to do things before I am ready, so be it. I am confident that I will find the path that makes sense for me. I've been slow to do it, but it's going to happen. I can feel myself approaching normal.
Approaching Normal is the name of a Blue October album - it's probably the start of the decline in their musical quality (although the last album is more mellow and is a departure from the more raw sound of previous albums. I don't want to come across as a "they changed they sound" complainer; it's prior to this album that I felt their music started declining, not just that I didn't like the new sound as much), but there are definitely some good songs off of the album, ones that I, and many others, can relate to. It's the little things that I notice improving. Part of getting a new place has helped, as it's a fresh start, and I now I have a strong incentive to make the place nice. I'm back to immediately doing dishes after eating or spending extra time to put items away. I'm determined to not let myself fall into complacency with the upkeep of the unit, and in time I think that's going to translate more and more into other aspects of my behavior. A little confidence and motivation goes a long way. I know I have to get back to the point where I push myself more than I do now, and finding the balance between not pushing enough and pushing too much is going to be a delicate process, but I have more belief in myself to accomplish that than I have for a long time. With that, I'll end with a song that is actually off their latest album.
The beauty is
I'm learning how to face my beast
Starting now to find some peace
Set myself free
Today
I don't have to fall apart
I don't have to be afraid
I don't have to let the damage consume me
Saturday, May 10, 2014
I Got my First DSLR...Now What?
Ah, the ever neglected photo portion of the blog. Well, they've all been a bit neglected of late, but none more than photography. Why? Well, I think I may end up writing another entry to explain why. For now, though, I think I'll actually write a photo related post.
Congratulations, you got your first DSLR (or camera with manual options, but for the purpose of this post, I'm going to say DSLR). Now, maybe you know something about photography, maybe you don't. All you know is you've now got a camera with all these settings and options, and you have absolutely no idea how to work it. What is all this? How do you go about shedding that novice photographer tag? Well, I'll share some basics with you, and a piece of advice I listed for concert photography here is just as applicable to photography in general. The sooner you pick up some of the basic photography concepts AND know how your camera incorporates these concepts in the various settings, the sooner you'll be laughing at the fact you even considered using auto mode.
The very first thing to understand in photography, and this is beaten to death everywhere, is the exposure triangle:
Congratulations, you got your first DSLR (or camera with manual options, but for the purpose of this post, I'm going to say DSLR). Now, maybe you know something about photography, maybe you don't. All you know is you've now got a camera with all these settings and options, and you have absolutely no idea how to work it. What is all this? How do you go about shedding that novice photographer tag? Well, I'll share some basics with you, and a piece of advice I listed for concert photography here is just as applicable to photography in general. The sooner you pick up some of the basic photography concepts AND know how your camera incorporates these concepts in the various settings, the sooner you'll be laughing at the fact you even considered using auto mode.
The very first thing to understand in photography, and this is beaten to death everywhere, is the exposure triangle:
- Aperture - the size of the opening in your lens that allows light to reach the sensor
- Shutter speed - how fast the camera shutter opens, allows light coming through the opening in the lens, and closes
- ISO - Setting for a camera's light sensitivity (think film speed)
Balancing these three items is what yields getting an appropriate exposure. A photo that is overexposed will be too bright and washed out, and a photo that is underexposed will be too dark. It used to be that you had to completely set a camera according to the specifications you calculated using a light meter, and perhaps some experience. Now the camera can do it for you, and it does a fairly good job of it most of the time. What this enables you to do is pick which of the three items you want to change, and let the camera choose the other two for you, or pick two of the three items and let the camera pick the last item for you. Here's the overview on the three:
Aperture - what people get wrong on this is that the aperture number is usually expressed as f4, but the actuality is that it is f/4. Because the 4 is in the denominator of the fraction, the bigger that number, the smaller the hole in the lens. Stands to reason that a smaller hole lets less light in, so other things equal, changing the hole to be smaller will require either letting the shutter stay open longer, or increasing the sensitivity to light. Aperture controls the depth of field of a shot, which in laymen's terms is how blurry or clear the foreground and background of a photo are.
Shutter speed - this too is almost always going to be a fraction. As the number gets larger (say from one sixtieth of a second to one thirtieth of a second), the amount of light getting into the camera increases, so a smaller aperture or less light sensitivity is needed, other things equal. Shutter speed controls the motion in a photo; a fast shutter speed freezes motion while a slow shutter speed will have motion blur.
ISO - the larger the ISO, the more sensitive your sensor is to light. This is the tool you'll use to get the result you want if you have a particular aperture and shutter speed you want to use for a photo. The higher the ISO, the less crisp a photo is due to the introduction of noise into the photo.
Okay, great, so you've got the basics of the triangle, but how do you use them? Well, the three main modes you should become used to are your shutter priority mode, your aperture priority mode, and manual mode. Each camera has a different way of denoting it on its dial, so me stating what they are on my camera may not help you. Experiment with these modes; work on aperture mode when you want to control depth of field or when you know you'll challenged to capture light easily. If you want a nice, blurry background, like for a portrait, you'll want a wider aperture, so a smaller number in the denominator. For more crisp, clear backgrounds, you'll want a larger number in the denominator, which is what you'll want for something like landscape photography. If you are taking action shots, say of children playing or a sports event, you'll want to use shutter priority with a fast shutter speed, likely around 1/250 of a second (but experiment to get the results you'd like). For night shots, you'll need a longer shutter speed (and likely a tripod or very high ISO). Play around in each of these modes at different ISO levels. While it is pretty simple to get the mathematical relationship between "stops", many people don't think in those terms, so trial and error is the way you can navigate around having to think about the numbers too much. Lastly, what you may find is that the camera, while it may say that your photo is perfectly exposed, may not be giving you the results you want. I'll address the reason for that below, but one option you have is to bracket your photo by using an Exposure Value (EV) shift. Your camera will allow you to basically tell it to overexpose or underexpose a photo on purpose. Play around with it to see if it helps, or maybe you simply prefer to leave it one third of a stop (denoted by 0.3) down or up as a matter of style or preference. You can also place your camera into burst mode and make it so the camera takes three exposures, one at normal exposure, one that is underexposed, and one that is overexposed. This can come in handy if you don't have time to manually changed your settings between shots to tweak, but you want to have a margin of safety in case your camera doesn't get the result you want on a normal exposure.
There are a few other settings/buttons you'll want to know. First is your focusing mode. DON'T leave this on auto-selection; you want the focus on autofocus so the lens will focus to the point you select, but you don't want the camera picking where that point is for you. There are various modes you can put your focus into which primarily relate to whether or not your camera will follow focus on a moving object or if it stays focused on the point you picked regardless of if the subject moves or not. I typically leave it on AI single, which uses the latter of those two strategies. The other item of note is your camera's metering mode. Metering is how the camera evaluates the exposure of the image you are viewing through the lens. What the camera can do is evaluate the image as a whole, or if can give priority to some section of the center of the photo. Perhaps you find that your photo is too dark; that could be because the metering is set to evaluate the whole frame, and the bright sky makes the camera select a shutter speed that makes a person in the center of the photo remain underexposed. What you can do is change the metering to center weighted or spot metering to make the camera base the exposure on what is strictly towards or at the center of the frame. The shutter will stay open longer, the person will be properly exposed, but the sky will be overexposed in all likelihood. This is inevitable for photos where different portions of the frame have drastically deviant lighting.
These items should give you a good foundation to understand enough of what you are doing and give you ways to go out and try tinkering with your camera. Of course, taking pictures and learning from the shots you get is the only way to truly advance your comfort and skill level. That said, what are you waiting for? Get out there and shoot!
Friday, May 9, 2014
Birth Control and Pregnancy
Okay, so I write less and less as I have become more and more busy with life in general. The only fair thing for me to do is to try and make up for quantity with quality, and by quality, I mean creating a firestorm with controversial topics. Healthcare economics is something that interests me; I can't quite say what I have for it is passion, as if I was passionate about it, I would seek out reading and discussion on it rather than let it come to me, but healthcare economics was my favorite topic of study in college. You'd never get me to shut up on the topic of health care economics, and since I don't want to write for the next 12 hours, I figure I will take a particular health care issue to discuss, which was primarily caused by the lunch conversation on health insurance along with seeing one of those pro life "a baby's heart is beating 18 days after conception" billboards.
Now, here's a disclaimer: I don't typically discuss politics or religion at all, and I try to avoid discussing really divisive hot button items. Why? There's no point. The percentage of people able to hold a civil conversation with differing opinions just seems to continuously decline while ignorance increases. As such, it is much easier to just steer clear of it altogether. If someone directly asks me a question, I will answer it, but I won't instigate, and I won't voluntarily contribute to a discussion more often that not on one of these two topics. To me, the fact that most people cannot and could not identify any political or religious beliefs I have is a positive, as it is important to me to be an open-minded person, someone who is impartial on issues and bases conclusions on rationality and not emotion. At the end of the day, my thought is "who the hell am I to think my opinion is worth more than anyone else's?" It's not worth more, but the ability to analyze facts and come to a logical conclusion is not something that is as disputable as an opinion based on any sort of bias or emotion.
At lunch yesterday there was a discussion about healthcare. The topic of birth control never came up once, but obviously it has been a huge issue discussed. What my problem is for many things is hypocrisy. Look, I get it, not everyone likes birth control for one reason or another. Maybe they are religiously opposed. Maybe they are opposed to forcing someone to pay for something they don't agree with as part of an insurance policy. Maybe they are opposed to making someone pay for a coverage they will never utilize. I get all that, with perhaps the last reason the piece I'd focus on. I'm not going to change anyone's opinions on moral grounds. It just isn't going to happen. What I can't idly sit by and accept without being irritated is this thought that "we shouldn't have to pay for birth control if we don't use it" unless that same argument is applied consistently.
So basically, here is the argument people make: "Why should we have to pay for birth control in our health insurance premiums if we don't use it? It's not fair."
And here is how one might respond: "Why should we have to pay for you to pop a kid out? It's way more expensive, makes up a larger component of an insurance premium, and quite frankly, we don't need more people on this overpopulated planet."
I just don't see where people get off thinking that it makes sense for maternity expenses to have to be included in health insurance policies but birth control shouldn't be. Like I said, as long as the sentiment is consistent, it's preposterous to me. I completely understand that health insurance is different from other types of insurance. I suggest it should differ less; make coverages separate. A homeowners policy doesn't include coverage for replacement cost on personal property unless you add it for an additional premium. An auto policy doesn't offer towing and rental car coverages unless you add it for an additional premium. If a woman doesn't want to ever have kids, knows it, and doesn't want to subsidize people who do want kids, she shouldn't have to pay for it. The problem here is twofold: there's an attitudinal problem and a structural problem. While I could write quite a bit on each, the short version is 1) people don't think they should have to pay for things of others, but then they think their specific needs should be covered, and 2) we have a system that requires people and employers to purchase coverage that is not customized to their needs unless they want to be fined. The employment based structure is problematic for a number of reasons, but the one I am addressing here is that the employer has to secure a group policy that meets the needs of the entire group instead of letting people shop for the coverage that suits them best (and the options for an individual are not robust anyhow).
Before I fall into a never-ending session of postulating on health care and insurance, I'll wrap this one up just by asking why it is so hard for people to open their eyes? One of my biggest irritants is the preponderance of double standards that one is confronted with day in and day out. Assuming that the healthcare system here is not beyond repair (which I believe it is - there are just too many factors all playing into it for it to be otherwise), I really think the attitudinal differences are going to have to play a bigger role than any structural differences. There are a lot of very different healthcare systems out there with much more efficient outcomes for the same or better health results, so it should demonstrate that you can make a number of structures work provided the public has the appropriate attitude accompanying it.
So basically, here is the argument people make: "Why should we have to pay for birth control in our health insurance premiums if we don't use it? It's not fair."
And here is how one might respond: "Why should we have to pay for you to pop a kid out? It's way more expensive, makes up a larger component of an insurance premium, and quite frankly, we don't need more people on this overpopulated planet."
I just don't see where people get off thinking that it makes sense for maternity expenses to have to be included in health insurance policies but birth control shouldn't be. Like I said, as long as the sentiment is consistent, it's preposterous to me. I completely understand that health insurance is different from other types of insurance. I suggest it should differ less; make coverages separate. A homeowners policy doesn't include coverage for replacement cost on personal property unless you add it for an additional premium. An auto policy doesn't offer towing and rental car coverages unless you add it for an additional premium. If a woman doesn't want to ever have kids, knows it, and doesn't want to subsidize people who do want kids, she shouldn't have to pay for it. The problem here is twofold: there's an attitudinal problem and a structural problem. While I could write quite a bit on each, the short version is 1) people don't think they should have to pay for things of others, but then they think their specific needs should be covered, and 2) we have a system that requires people and employers to purchase coverage that is not customized to their needs unless they want to be fined. The employment based structure is problematic for a number of reasons, but the one I am addressing here is that the employer has to secure a group policy that meets the needs of the entire group instead of letting people shop for the coverage that suits them best (and the options for an individual are not robust anyhow).
Before I fall into a never-ending session of postulating on health care and insurance, I'll wrap this one up just by asking why it is so hard for people to open their eyes? One of my biggest irritants is the preponderance of double standards that one is confronted with day in and day out. Assuming that the healthcare system here is not beyond repair (which I believe it is - there are just too many factors all playing into it for it to be otherwise), I really think the attitudinal differences are going to have to play a bigger role than any structural differences. There are a lot of very different healthcare systems out there with much more efficient outcomes for the same or better health results, so it should demonstrate that you can make a number of structures work provided the public has the appropriate attitude accompanying it.
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