I have hit the wall, and the wall has fallen on me.
As this spring, the 13th in Coupeville Sports history, has played out, I have not been as attentive as normal to my blogging duties.
Yes, I still have written a story for every game, varsity or JV, but I haven’t been at games in person as often as usual.
I have given you the facts this spring, but not always the zing.
I missed games at the start, devoting time to instead helping my sister and her family prepare for their move from Freeland to West Virginia.
One moment it’s an idea that seems illogical and unlikely.
Then a moving date is set, but it seems far away.
Then you’re left, alone, stirring the embers in the fire pit out by the half-buried big rock in their front yard one last time, with no one around anymore to tell you that “No, Uncle David, you can’t put leftover carpet cleaning chemicals on the fire like your dad used to back in the ’80s. It’s bad for the environment.”
I should be grateful I got a somewhat unexpected seven-year run with my nephews here on Whidbey, after my sister moved back to the island from Maple Valley.
Instead, I am trying, and often failing, to adjust to reality, which is that instead of me Ubering them around, they are now 3,000+ miles away, and I have yet to leave the West Coast in my lifetime.
My birthday hit last week, and that’s 54 years of thinking Idaho is just a little too East for my liking, much less the rest of those Godforsaken states spilling across the map.
After my nephews left during spring break, not to return, I have been at more games.
But I still have skipped too many, finding excuses not to go, such as the eternal fallback of “I think I need a nap.”
And yes, I am aware that’s a sign of depression.
But sleepy time does allow me a bit of time not to deal with my other reality — that the only way Coupeville Sports has survived for nearly 13 years, and 12,000+ articles, is that I have embraced a life of abject poverty.
And it’s really not working anymore. If it ever did.
I started the blog in self-righteous anger in 2012, after the Coupeville Examiner was sold and thousands of my bylines were flushed down a (proverbial) toilet.
I’ve mellowed (a bit) since then, and the focus of my writing (mostly) got more upbeat.
But you can only smash your head against the brick wall of reality so long.
Living donation to donation is not a viable business plan. Never was. Never will be.
I am eternally grateful to all that have helped me, either financially or with kind words.
The level of support I have seen over the past 13 years is mind-boggling at times.
If you felt my appreciation, I am glad.
If you did not, I apologize for not being clear enough in my thanks.
Without your support, this blog would have died in its first year. But it endured, a lot longer than anticipated.
My current plan is to make it to May 31.
That’s the last day of high school sports in Washington for the 2024-2025 school year, with state championship action wrapping up for track and field that afternoon.
The younger two of my three nephews started school in South Whidbey after the move to the island, went to home schooling for a bit, then moved into Coupeville schools.
I thought I would get to see them go through the next couple of years right near my duplex. I was wrong.
The reality is, as limited as my bills are, I can’t pay them.
And I never will be able to consistently while trying to live from donation to donation, especially as the people who have supported me deal with their own hazy financial futures in a world dominated by scam artists.
It’s time to get out from under the wall which has crashed down on me.
Take less naps.
Accept reality.
Get a job which includes a consistent paycheck, while joining the mass exodus of resignations happening this spring on the prairie.
We make plans, and they change.
And everything, even “Coupeville Sports,” ends.
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