Safe At Home by Alyssa Milano

Alyssa, thank you for this wonderful book. I found it very soothing.

I just wanted to let my family know that I finally finished reading Alyssa Milano's great tome and fascinating tribute to baseball and family. It brought me to tears in the end. She is a great writer and has really uncovered some truths about baseball. I will have to give baseball another look, especially now, since I have so much time on my hands.

You see, I just recently got laid off. I know I mentioned it a few weeks ago, but the realities are starting to sink in. My final paychecks have just run out and I am waiting for the unemployment to kick in. The depression has already kicked in. I get up in the morning, check my e-mail for responses to the e-mails and resumes I sent out the day before and last week and the week before that. (Yes, I know it is a run-on sentence.) The e-mails lately have been about new openings on the jobsites I signed up for. I respond to them.

I am actually applying for 4 to 5 new jobs a day. I might have to print a stack of resume's and hit the road. On some sites they prefer that you don't show up at their door. On those, I wait for the call.

I have a list of the apps in a binder on my desk and I have the application dates listed on my calendar. I plan on contacting them again in about a week after receiving my resume and application. I have heard no responses other than from the companies that are hoping that I am some one I am not.

And so, the depression sets in. I have worked for 40 years. I put myself through college, supported myself and my wife while raising two children. I now have too much time on my hands. I use it to read the books I have been stacking for several years.

Friends and faithful readers know me as a lapsed baseball fan. I thoroughly enjoyed Ms. Milano's book, but I don't think it will rekindle the flame that once was there. I have other books to read, other fires to stoke. But I do agree with her about baseball and life in general. She has awakened in me a feeling of nostalgia for a game I used to love. She has a wonderful writing style and a great philosophy on life.

But I am looking forward. I am trying to remake myself into someone I have always dreamed of being. I have ideas. I can write, too. I may have enough for a book also. But I lack the cohesion of one topic. I shall keep plugging away.

I find my days spent now trying to discover new paths. Old paths are becoming overgrown with uncertainty and chance. There are no guarantees. Ever. I remember the quote from Shaw. To paraphrase, The people who succeed in this world are not those looking for their perfect situations but those who, not finding the situations to their liking, go out and create one for them to succeed. I am looking for that opportunity.

Perhaps I'll drive a truck.

D.