Therapy In Strat-o-matic

This blog has not been updated with TBL statistics in weeks. This post won’t further that initiative either. Suffice it to say, the league is continuing in due time, mostly over at our YouTube channel. As I said, this post will deal with a completely different topic.

I’m currently going through a lengthy vocational transition period. The uncertainty hangs over my daily routine: drive to work, split time between accomplishing tasks and commiserating with peers paddling in the same hole-filled canoe as myself, drive home, and try and conclude the day with something other than the desolation of the unknown.

For a period of time I tried other “stress relief” activities such as those adult coloring books or crossword puzzles or just plain ol’ throwing on the television. Nothing really stuck that much. I’m a hobby guy, and all but a couple of hobby activities have stuck for longer than 2-3 months. It’s just who I am.

An online acquaintance suggested Strat-o-matic baseball when he saw me post a scoresheet from an MLB Network broadcast of a Royals-White Sox game in May. Returning to scoring ball games was another attempt to preoccupy my mind.

At that point, things changed.

My parents helped enable this pursuit for me, knowing that I was in the midst of one of the more unsettling periods of my life. I looked forward to asking for the game as a potential Christmas gift; a frivolous board game wasn’t something that fit into our budget while pushing most of our funds into reducing debt. Instead I opened the mailbox, and there was a card with a check telling me to get the game right then and there.

And so I did. A few days later began my days as a cards & dice Strat player. After a couple of basic games, I realized just how much it took my mind off of the doom and gloom that would regularly creep into my mind as I’d be sitting and watching this or that. I then started the TBL after seeing the number of people doing solo projects out there. Adding a league structure that gave me my own world to control further distracted me, giving me something to strive towards on my off-hours.

The outlook is no better at the moment. Sure, as a Christ follower I don’t fear the future. But it doesn’t change the coming and going of unease, especially while I’m at work. But the TBL is my place to go to escape. Rattling around the dice, trying to decide whether to hit-and-run or play off the card, managing the lineups…it’s a fictional world where jobs and bills and mortgages don’t exist.

That helps to cope with unproductive feelings. Not to mention, I’ve found my next hobby.