Opening Day 2026

Resurrecting my written thoughts about the Mariners losing the 2025 ALCS, that I wrote the day after said heartbreaking loss…

"This [post] has no preface, because it is a [post] about prefacing."

My thoughts on unique heartbreak, held candles, Game 7s, and tomorrow.

“What is grief if not love persevering?”

This one stings. This one hurts. While it is possible in retrospect to acknowledge the momentum we lost upon returning home, and subsequently that which was gained by the Jays propelled them to victory, we all know that the homer was twisting the knife. 

Of course it was Springer. It had to be him. It has to hurt as much as it can. 

These are lies we tell ourselves to numb the pain. In reality, it didn’t have to be him. If you accept the canon event of ‘Mariners lose, Blue Jays win’, it could have been any of them. We all know baseball doesn’t work like that, and the fact that it was Springer was just an unhappy coincidence of batting order. Of bunts thrown away and walks randomly given. Such is the way of things. 

They’ll get there one day. 

I have a tendency to lash my emotional ups and downs to the fate of the Mariners. It’s easy for me, because they’ve never gotten where we’ve wanted them to go. And I, like them, have never gotten where I’ve wanted to go. As the years tick on and I continue my perpetual state of being the terminally single friend™ in seemingly all of my social circles, my natural disposition is to lean more and more on external factors in which to find emotional validation. “Sure, I’m in my 30s never having been in a loving romantic relationship, but…” and then I fill in the blanks. Holding that candle alongside the “my team has never been to the big dance” candle has helped me feel special. Like my various stops and starts and tiltings of fate have been predestined to sharpen my pain into a special kind of story that will eventually reach its own conclusion. 

The stadium lights at T-Mobile Park

Every team but one has to lose. 

Maybe it’s just me, I’m not sure. But my heart can really only take so many instances of “you’ll have your moment, too” being told to me by people who have been in happy relationships for longer than How I Met Your Mother was on the air. I know they mean well, and I know they believe it, but is that supposed to make me feel better? As I get older and I keep trying and failing or not even making it out of the gate, I feel my number of chances shrink. And every failed one, every whiff, every shot that I miss starts to take on more significance. And it makes the misses hurt more. 

The Blue Jays waited for a long time, too. 

The human condition is to fail, eventually. Whosever fault it is, it’s somebody’s fault, and we are allowed to blame them. But it is a fact that we all have to accept. The shortcomings we have in getting to where we are, and the obstacles we have placed in our own way. The genuine bad luck that stopped us when we could have crossed the finish line. The other flawed humans succeeding where we failed simply by a luck of the draw. Fate isn’t real, at least insofar as it does and doesn’t impact individual decisions. Or relationships. Or baseball games. 

It’s just a game.

Julio Rodriguez at bat against the Milwaukee Brewers on July 21, 2025 | Shot on Kodak Ektar 100

But my emotions are real, 1st-person omniscient narrator!

Why did the Mariners have to find this, the most unique way they could have without actually giving me a taste of what I wanted, to break my heart?

I can accept losing in the World Series, just like I can accept relationships ending.

Everything ends, eventually.

But I just wanted to get there. Just to know what it’s like.

Just to know what it feels like to say “the Mariners are going to be in the World Series”.

Just because stars burn out, doesn’t mean I didn’t want to feel this one, even for a moment.

The crowd at T-Mobile Park | Shot on Kodak Ektar 100

deep breath

"You'll find someone some day, Aaron".

"It's good to not cheat, cheaters never prosper."

"The Mariners will get there one day."

These are things I've been told, either here, by friends, family, or strangers.

I believe all of them.

It's hard to believe any of them.

We eagerly anticipated the rise of a new sun, but were denied its warmth.

We may still see it one day. But for now, I just feel cold.

A bus | Kodak Ultramax 400