October is the scariest month of the year. I’m not sure why. Maybe because fall symbolizes our transition into a season of death. Maybe because winter’s too cold to be scary and summer can’t possibly be scary if it’s also the season of the tank top.
I’m a professional writer. That means they actually pay me to write the words. It’s a good job and I take it seriously. That’s why I know a thing or two about writing utensils. Before the children were born, I would always write with a pen. I was quite particular about my pen. I went through an expensive fountain pen phase, an expensive fineliner phase, and an expensive rollerball phase. I later moved through more economical versions of the same phases. I wrote with domestic pens, European pens, Asian pens. I toyed with tip sizes, jumping back and forth between medium and fine. I also experimented with colors—including a short-lived but regrettable stint with green. All I wanted was a pen (or three) that would make me a better writer than everyone else. Is that really so much to ask? Which is why, when my seven-year-old daughter asked for scented markers, I thought: Holy smokes. I never even considered scented markers. And so, today, we must.
It’s true that here at Beyond Reason, we occasionally make fun of things. Bunting. Cornhole. My seven-year-old daughter. But perhaps the leitmotif — the running joke readers have come to expect — is on pickleball.
As you know, here at “Beyond Reason,” we always tackle the biggest, most important issues of the day. A philosophical conundrum. A Buddhist koan. The t-shirt gun. Look, if it’s in Beyond Reason, it’s important. That’s why, this week, it’s time to consider bunting.
I make a lot of jokes here at Beyond Reason. Some are at the expense of the game of pickleball. Some are the expense of the pickleball players. While I do try to make other jokes about other topics—bugs, potato salad, and, of course, gourds—heretofore, I’ve never attempted a single joke about the Dewey Decimal System.
America believes in second chances. It’s the land of reinvention. The country that invented brunch, rebooted Batman eleven times, and gave Paul Giamatti a leading man phase. And now, it has done the impossible: turned a backyard barbecue game into a professional sport.
Germany is efficient. France is flirtatious. Canada apologizes for being in your way, even though I don’t know anyone on their way to the North Pole other than Will Steiger. But America? If you want to understand America, skip the textbooks or history lessons. At a distance, just observe the month of July.
He began with frogging. Then jigging. By noon, he said, he’d be hula popping. I kept nodding, as though these were natural things for a man to say while I was drinking my first cup of coffee. Or ever.
Generally, I go ‘round without a hat. A hat squeezes the head, itches the scalp. Plus, I like my hair. But we live in interesting, challenging, new times. We must rise to the occasion. Sometimes, to meet the moment, a man needs a hat.
The energy in the auditorium was already electric. Every single act in the middle school variety show received thunderous applause, a standing ovation. It was the last day of school and the audience was determined to love everything. Then the next act brought out a T-shirt gun.