Sweatpants

"You know the message you're sending out to the world with these sweatpants? You're telling the world, 'I give up. I can't compete in normal society. I'm miserable, so I might as well be comfortable.'"
- Jerry and George, Seinfeld, in "The Pilot"

I used to wear sweatpants every single day of my life except for Sundays.

This confession may come as a shock to you, seeming how the vast majority of you only see me in my present state as the guy nominated for "Best Dressed on Campus" (which, I didn't win, thank goodness).  But, it's the 100% truth. I would wear sweatpants to school (this is when I wasn't homeschooled). I would wear them to the camp where my parents worked. I would wear them on social outings. I would wear them to T-Ball practice. The only time I wouldn't wear them was on Sundays, when I would insist on donning a full suit and tie. Every Sunday. To church. I also wanted braces, and freckles, and big glasses (which, my parents eventually bought me in the form of safety goggles...but that's another story).

I was a peculiar little boy.

I was on the T-Ball team in Medford, Wisconsin - the place where I lived. One particular year, when I was 5 or 6, there were these two nice ladies, probably in their 20's, who decided to coach the team. I liked them, they were nice, except they had a very strange propensity to yell the phrase "Hustle Hustle Hustle!!!!" whenever they felt like it, which was quite often. The first several weeks of practice, I ignored it. I had no idea what the words "Hustle Hustle Hustle" meant and the rest of the kids on the team didn't seem to either. One day though, I decided to find out. You see, on that day, the people who were supposed to set up all of the equipment for practice hadn't done their job, therefore the two lady coaches decided it would be our job to set up the equipment. Unfortunately, the shed where all the equipment was held was located on the complete other side of the baseball diamond AND the high school football field where we practiced. The lady coaches explained this to us nicely and then burst out yelling "Hustle Hustle Hustle!!!!" Everyone on the team started running across the field.

Except me.

"What does hustle mean?" I asked one of the lady coaches. She looked at me. Looked away, yelled "Hustle Hustle Hustle!!!!" again to the people who were beginning to slow down from utter exhaustion, and looked at me again. "It means you have to run really, really, fast. Now HUSTLE HUSTLE HUSTLE!!!!!" I jumped and started running. Except, my sweatpants were particularly loose that day. (I'm not entirely sure why I wasn't wearing a team uniform...but oh well).

Kersplat. (It had rained the night before). I hit the muddy ground with my face. My sweatpants stopped before my little body did, so I kinda slid partway out of them. It wasn't pretty, but thankfully everyone else on the team had already reached the shed and were too busy trying to hit each other with the T to watch little Matthias have a wardrobe malfunction.

Needless to say, that was the day I stopped wearing sweatpants to practice. I still wore them everywhere else for a several more years until I discovered that jeans weren't as horribly awful as I thought ("my gosh, these are actually comfortable! and they look better than sweatpants too!"). Now, I don't even own a single pair. Thank goodness.
-Matthias

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Working Days...

Sweat cleanses from the inside. It comes from places a shower will never reach.
-George Sheehan

Sometimes surprises come along when working outside. Several hours ago, I should have been outside working in a dilapidated barn throwing old things into a rusty dumpster. But, as I was moving around the barn to the epic music that I had forgotten existed on my magic-music-playing-device (it really was epic, I felt like I was in some kind of incredible movie, the wind whipping my hair and everyone in the theater watching and thinking ‘my gosh, he is so good at throwing away trash, I wish I could be as cool as him,’ plus there was a thunderstorm), I noticed movement...

The music swells as the hero's pulse begins to race, now he gets to scare away some evil beast before he can continue his cleaning escapades! The hero sneaks up to the moving critter as the music becomes increasingly intense. The theater audience thinks ‘What is he going to do!? Our hero is about to become even more awesome!’

Then, the hero jumps back and starts running away.

The evil beast was not an unsuspecting opossum like the hero thought. The evil beast was not a squirrel, or a mouse, or a large version of the many frogs found previously in the day.

The evil beast was a skunk.

The soundtrack changes to some kind of late 90’s attempt at hip hop. The hero quickly, but quietly runs to the other side of the barn and quivers behind a wall peeking at the small black and white striped animal through a knothole.

Transition. The film ends with a shot of the once cool hero, dripping from the rain, at a computer typing something on Tumblr. There goes the epic end to that movie.

Oh well…maybe the next one will be better.
-Matthias

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Let's go on a Walk!

“My grandmother started walking five miles a day when she was sixty. She's ninety-seven now, and we don't know where the hell she is.”
-Ellen DeGeneres

This is Kasey. She is one of the two incredibly cute beagles that own my Aunt's house - where I am residing for the summer. Kasey loves to go on walks, which is fortunate because I also love to go on walks, and having company is quite nice. The walks that we take typically occur in the evening once the sun has lost the majority of its fury. Today was different though, today we went on a walk right after lunch. This is the story of that walk:

I enter the scene after eating lunch, agitated. "Nothing is working right with this website that I'm trying to fix! I need to go on a wal..."  I catch myself before the whole word comes out, but unfortunately the damage has already been done. Out of nowhere bounds an excited miniature beagle wagging her tail. Snap.

Queen Kasey sits down and stares at me with her head cocked to one side knowing that no matter how hard I try, I cannot deny her anything. I'm pretty sure she fully realizes that this look will take her all the way to being voted President of the United States if she wants. I head towards the door and put on the red collar thingy that isn't a collar when I notice that I don't have my sunglasses and that I need to pee. "Just a second Kasey, I'll be back! I will! No, don't look at me like that! I'M SORRY, OKAY!?"

Halfway into the walk, Kasey stops being content with sniffing the sidewalk and decides that she's ready to follow an imaginary trail deep into the underbrush alongside the trail on which we're walking. That's when the battle starts. "Kasey, who is walking who here? Stop pulling on the flipping leash and being so stubborn!" She just stares back at me. "Kasey, I am going to pick you up and carry you back to the house if you don't cooperate!" The stare turns into a look of utter shock mixed with an air of 'you wouldn't dare'. But, the threat works and we continue with the walk.

A beaver has built a home by the trail system, turning a lot of the trail into a marshy swamp. Kasey is quite excited about the water and wants to go wading. At first glance, this seems like a fun idea. Then I notice the swarm. Billions of bugs notice me all at the same time and within seconds I am surrounded. "*cough* Kasey! Kasey, get over here! We need to go...*cough cough choke*" Through the bugs I can barely make out the shape of a little dog staring at me with an 'I win' look.

As the walk continues, Princess Kasey gets tired. From previous walks with her highness, I've learned to dread this part most of all. You see, when Princess Kasey is tired, she just walks over to the grass and flops on her side, limp. It is impossible to get her back on her feet, no amount of pulling on the leash, picking her up and trying to set her on her feet, or any other method will convince her that we need to get home. In desperation, I decide to experiment. I brave the swarm one more time to collect a small amount of water in my hands. Then, I sneak up behind the little doggie and *spash!*

I win.

We get back home, Matthias feeling triumphant, Kasey with hurt pride. She walks up to my aunt, looks at her accusingly ('why didn't you save me!?') and plops on her favorite blanket, eyes watching me the rest of the afternoon.

YOU were the one who wanted to go on a walk.
-Matthias

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