Perspective. Not only is it extremely beneficial when examining your childhood, but it also pretty much catalysed the Renaissance. Remarkably, humans spent millenia plodding around this planet without a systematic approach to realistically representing the world around them onto a flat surface. Over the course of the last thousand years, however, a Muslim scientist’s resarch into vision made its way to an Italian painter, who revolutionised his craft. This shared knowledge traversed the globe over the ensuing centuries, eventually reaching my mother, who, perhaps alarmed by my cubist tendencies, spent an evening with me in early January explaining such concepts as proportion and vanishing points.

She demonstrated these techniques to me by drawing a house that, if memory serves me correctly, looked significantly better than the mimetic depiction I subquently mustered. Nevertheless, I was eager to show off my newfound skills as soon as possible. Despite its flaws, it is not nearly as jarring as the Satire on False Perspective.

While many of the other football games I chronicled have largely been forgotten by history, the epic contest I witnessed the day before remains one of the most memorable clashes in NFL history. My account of what is now known simply as The Comeback is entirely accurate: After a lacakadaisical half-plus of football, the reigning AFC Champion Buffalo Bills stormed back from a 32-point defecit with one touchdown, and then three more, taking the lead and eventually winning the game in overtime. I was just old enough to really understand what was going on, and it was thrilling to be a witness to history*.

Watching the highlights again today is deeply anachronistic. The game is instantly dated not only by the standard-definition footage and simplistic motion design, but the lack of official video replay review that would have nullified a crucial Buffalo touchdown.

At the same time, however, the contest could have been part of this past weekend’s action. Just sit back and truly soak in the orchestral revelry that is the ESPN NFL Primetime Highlight Song. Let Chris Berman and Tom Jackson do their good-cop-bad-joke-cop routine for the umpteenth time, and you may just forget that Houston Oilers have long since ceased to exist - assuming you’re part of the 50% of my readership who knew they did in the first place.

*History in the sense that in 100 years, no one will care anymore. That’s not to say we don’t know about century-old sports results, just that it’s hard for us to imagine these events today as anything more than “a bunch of dead guys running around.”

Sitting here nearly twenty years later, it’s not immediately clear to me which thought was more naïve: that I’d have a professional football career right now, or that I could somehow relay a specific demonstration of agility in one of my illustrations. What, exactly, did I evision would be my signature? A dive? A 360-degree spin? A double move?

On the last day of school before winter break, I suppose I could be forgiven for dreaming of touchdowns. I’d been a full-time student for all of 15 weeks, and I was ready for a vacation. The upcoming week was a boundless horizon of unquantifiable time – I might actually be grown up by 1993 – right?

None of my athletic aspirations truly panned out, but I’m not without any “moves.” For instance, I’m excellent at anticipating the path of a falling object and snatching it before it hits the ground. The most impressive diving catch I’ve ever made was in my girlfriend’s ktichen, reaching out at full extension to save a glass jar. So, uh, take that, Plaxico Burress!

There are two plausible justifications for the appearance of “wanted” here:

1. Football-obsessed as I was, I thirsted constantly for the action of the gridiron. “Wanting to watch a football game” was a more-or-less constant state of being, and Monday Night Football just so happened to coincide conveniently with this ever-present desire.

2. In 1992, Monday Night Football games kicked off at 9 PM Eastern, meaning that my viewing the game to its completion would have required my parents allowing me to stay up unconscionably late. I watched some of the game, but was compelled to go bed long before the final whistle. In this interpretation, I wanted to watch a football game, ergo, an entire football game, but did not. It was only in the morning on TV that I’d find out about the 41-7 final score .

In either case, one thing is certain: I was shortchanged! After “alouing” another egregious spelling error to go unnoted, Mrs. Judge saw it fit to get back into the business of fixing common sports idioms. In reality, “clinched the playoffs” is a vastly more popular turn of phrase than “clinched playoff position,” which is typically relegated to serving as an explanatory footnote in league tables.

“Perfection,” for those who don’t remember, was one of the great children’s games of the 90’s. Yes, it was mind-numbingly repetetive, but it was also exhilarating. It didn’t even matter that it wasn’t particularly fun: it came from the TV!

When you’re marketing products to children, you don’t have to bother with banal concepts like “taste” or “reasoning.” You just blast right in there and create an imperative!

PUT THE PIECES INTO THE SLOT
What pieces?! There are pieces? Slot, where’s a slot?

MAKE THE RIGHT SELECTION
What, wrong? I don’t want to be wrong! I’M A GOOD BOY!!

BUT BE QUICK, YOU’RE RACING THE CLOCK
Omigod, omigod, omiGODDDDDDD

POP GOES PERFECTION
MOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMM BUY ITTTTTTT

As babbies mature into sentient beings, it becomes a high priority to provide the building blocks of the education they’ll need to function in society: numbers so they can count, letters so they can read, and even toys so they can share. Even more important than all of these fundamentals, however, is basic havoc-mitigation: “bleach is not a drink”, “knives are for food, not brothers,” and above all, “fire is extremely dangerous.” By the time I entered kindergarten, I hadn’t received many acknowledgments of distinction, but I did have a certificate proclaiming that I would “not play games with Fanny Flame.”

Thus, it wasn’t the mere prospect of gifts that excited me as Chanukah drew nearer; the very fact that I would be permitted to take the enkindled candle in my hand on the first night was itself thrilling. Such a benevolent youth was I that the presents I was soon to receive were of little interest to me. Apparently, I was somehow equipped for the manufacture of teddy bears – perhaps it was a school project? – and firmly ensconced in the mindset that ‘twas better to give than receive.

Whether I successfuly met my quota is to this day unclear.

I didn’t only learn about science at the Sid Jacobson Jewish Community Center. Twice a week, for two or three years, I also trained in the art of Shotokan karate . The attainment of my yellow belt marked the pinnacle of what had been a rocky autumn at the dojo.

I earned the belt by memorising and performing the steps of the first kata, which is called, as I literally just found out, the Taikyoku Shodan. My sensei Eveyln was transfixed by my deft and decisive manoeuvres, which brought to mind images of the great Gichin Funakoshi himself. With such great skill on display, the furthest thing from her mind was the first day of class, when she watched me whimpering in my father’s arms at the back of the classroom, lamenting that I would have to take my shoes off in public.

In olden times (post-World War II), when a karateka achieved the next kyu, he would not receive a new obi of the according colour. Instead, he would dye his original white belt each successive colour, which necessitated that progressively darker hues accompany higher ranks. Presumably, this led to a strong sentimental connection between the practitioner and his equipment, at least to the extent that such a belt, unlike the yellow, orange, and green ones I obtained during my brief career, would not be thoughtlessly discarded after spending years wallowing at the bottom of a dresser drawer.

Without the convenience of an illustration, I’m left without even the slightest inkling of the festivities’ specifics. Austin was one of my brother’s nursery school classmates, so we were celebrating his fourth birthday party. I can only assume it involved the basics: pizza, soda, and periodic shrieking.

Everyone knows an Austin. I mean, yes, it’s been one of the most popular boy’s names in America over the past two decades, but that’s not what I’m getting at. Our memories are stocked full of people who never actually grew up: the twins who moved away, the family friends who ended up in a different district, the other kids at the pool. Sure, you and your friends went to high school and grew beards, but that fifth-grader who mercilessly beat you all the time (on the basketball court) is still ten years old and endowed with terrifc man boobs.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I was watching the first ever SEC Championship Game, which was actually the first college football conference championship game, full stop. Who cares? Not me! The 1992 season represented the apex of my interest in the college flavor of gridiron football, which has declined steadily since. Not that I’ve been missed – college football was booming then and has only become more lucrative. New bowl games have proliferated at the rate of one per year over the last two decades. I used to wonder why this was the case, until I found out that each of the participating institutions is awarded a large cash bounty! Unfortunately, this industry is built on the backs of young men who are largely being chewed up and spit out. (If you have time for nearly 15,000 words on this subject, there’s this seminal Atlantic article.)

If, on the other hand, your immediate reaction to this illustration was “Hey, I want to pour that on some meat!” you’re not alone.

A1 is one of the most popular condiments in the world, so I was concerned when I found its website was a dated crapfest. I was momentarily relieved to find the purveyors of a1sauce.com are just the Canadian manufacturers, only to find that American distributor Kraft Foods runs this even-more-Flash-infested, big-budget monstrosity only an ad exec could love. With such deep coffers, it’s no surprise that they’ve also got their own bowl game, the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl!

Is there really any better place than the back seat of an Oldsmobile to experience marvelous celetisial phenomena for the first time? To this very day, I remember the exact intersection where I sat, stopped at a red light on the service road of the Long Island Expressway, squirming about and craning my neck to as to avoid missing even a second of the action. After a few minutes, we were home, standing on the front lawn gazing up at the sky. A few months later, I wanted a telescope for my birthday, and this was largely why.

Serendepitious as this moment was, it was just now eclipsed (get it?). As I began to research this post, I naïvely expected to find the same relative of detail I provided nineteen years ago: “A lunar eclipse happened.” With the collective wealth of humanity at my fingertips, I discovered that the eclipse I’d witnessed that night was a big enough deal to have its own Wikipedia Page. Soon enough, I felt like I was right back in an optional science class.

As it turns out, that eclipse was one in a set of eclipses, or saros. Evidently, eclipses happen in eighteen-years-and-eleven-days-long cycles that are grouped into numbered saros series , which last for 1200-1500 years. The successive eclipses in a particular series are very similar, except that the second takes place 120 degrees westward 8 hours later in the day. After three such revolutions, an identical eclipse will occur in the same places at about the same time. Of course, there’s a word for that, too. Every 54 years and 33 days, the world is exactly the same, except for that it’s completely different. (Look for me to expound upon this further as part of Repeating “Repeating ‘Repeating’” First Grade on January 12, 2047.)

I was disappointed to realise that by forgetting to blog for a year, I’d missed the opportunity to celebrate the turning of the saros last December 21st. My sadness soon turned to glee as I realised the fates had offered me another coincidence in which to revel; earlier today, there was a total lunar eclipse, just like the one I watched when I was 6! I leapt out of my chair, jubilant. “Holy shit!” I exclaimed aloud, alone. I frantically raced to the keyboard, and tapped out a little tale of redemption.

This electrifying recollection of Brian Washington’s last-minute, game-winning touchdown belies its accuracy: In fact, this was the Jets’ fourth win of the season in their 13th try! It also belies the circumstance: The Jets “we’re happy” not only because they were victorious, but because it was an emotional, unlikely triumph, the team’s first game since Dennis Byrd was carted off the field of play, paralysed.

I was just happy because they won!

Many writers struggle bitterly with the appropriate usage of their vs. there vs. they’re. If you’re one of them, there’s an important lesson here: Never use th’re, it’s not a word. I learned this the hard way.

…Lo and behold, it would not be long at all. Only one week after tying the all-time NFL mark for receiving touchdowns, Jerry Rice claimed it for himself. This drama to which I’d subscribed reached its catharsis; indeed, the very word I breathlessly raced in to report found itself purged from the sentence!

It’s easy to assume that the intent of my illustration was merely to depict Candlestick Park at the moment of this achievement. That’s true, but I can say with reasonable certitude that what I really saw was the football field itself as the record book where Rice now stood alone, the surrounding thousands in their plastic seats swirling around numerous as the galaxies in the universe onto which he had now indelibly etched his name.

The vagaries of the English language are rife with opportunities to introduce imprecision. The so-called “garden path sentence,” which winds its readers’ attention back and forth on an idyllic journey to parseability, is a favourite of mine.

When you read a sentence like, “The exterior vent their frustrations,” everything starts off just fine! “The exterior vent,” gives you the distinct notion that we’re about to discuss an exhaust. But then, “their” boldly declares his presence, throwing you for a major WAT. Only then do you trudge back to “the exterior vent,” and realise that what you just read actually means, “The people outside are complaining.” Reading is hard, let’s have a picnic.

Today’s entry tugged me by the hand, giving me that familiar feeling I was being led down the garden path. As I reached “home,” however, I looked back in horror to see no route back to meaning. I had just (barely) survived a “teleporter sentence,” which is a term I just made up to describe when, a few words in, the reader suddenly finds himself, punctuation-free, in the middle of a completely different part of the narrative.

Long-time readers of this blog will not be surprised that I chose a Tuesday to experiment with both grammar and physics, as you all know exactly what was going on at my class at the Y.

Hey, You Said You Were Going To Do This Pretty Much Every Day In Synch With Your Journal From 1992

I still am! Unfortunately, I accidentally an entire year. It didn’t really feel like a long time. But still, that one’s on me. Seriously, my bad.

There’s still a lot of fun left to be had, so whether you’re rejoining this trip in progress, or you’re starting at the beginning, I’m happy to have you aboard again, anew.

Sports analysts seem to delight in magnifying the unique in the mundane. “This is the first time that two lefties from the same high school have pitched against each other during the first half of day-night doubleheader since the Ford administration!”

This frenzy is only intensified when the milestone is not an infrequent coincidence, but the relatively forseeable conquering of a statistical milestone. But it was 1992: I was yet to see Cal Ripken play his 2,131st game, or watch Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa chase down 61. In other words, when Jerry Rice caught the 100th touchdown pass of his career, I did not know that “records are made to be broken” was a thing. Everyone seemed so excited, I couldn’t help being swept up in the tide of history! After all, when would I again have an opportunity to witness something so momentous?

This entry actually is actually not from the 25th. It’s floating around around before the 16th, but I’ve decided to leave it here to coincide with the last day of school before Thanksgiving. In keeping with the vacation theme, I’m withholding all further comment except to surmise that this was probably the last time I ever misspelled “turkey.”

A long kick return for a score is one of the most exciting plays in football. To this day, I can barely contain myself when a Jet takes one back all the way. Just a few weeks ago during the Jets’ listless loss to the Ravens, I was nearly ejected from the Boston bar where I was watching the game after doing a lap around the bar at top speed, screaming “GO JOE! GO JOE! GO JOE!” as Joe McKnight sprinted 107 yards in one of that evening’s only bright spots.

Thus it’s no wonder that images of a 92-yard punt return would still be dancing around my head two days later, despite the fact the Giants ultimately lost ther game to the Eagles on November 22nd, 1992. At the time, I thought that Dave Meggett was on par with contemporaries like Emmitt Smith and Barry Sanders. And why not? For the duration of my football-watching-consciousness, he was one of the most electric returners in the league, playing for a team to which I was regularly exposed.

After 20 years of watching professional football, I know that flash-in-the-pan kick returners come and go, and that even a couple of All-Pro seasons don’t make for a permanent mark in the public’s consciousness. As it turns out, Dave Meggett isn’t an all-time great, he’s an incarcerated, serial sex offender.

Computers got to the house where I grew up long before I ever did. My dad began programming on time-sharing systems in the 1970s, and in 1987, he started a home-based financial-services software company, Ajay Financial Services, named after his newborn baby boy (me). In the late 80’s, “working from home on the computer” was not something one did curled up on the couch; my parents added a second floor onto our home to accomodate the business.

Upstairs lay a wonderland of circuitry that enchanted me from my earliest days, a buzzing office (with real partitions!) teeming with HP 3000 minicomputers, dot-matrix printers, eminently rideable chairs, and even a gigantic 9-track tape drive on wheels. If you’re having trouble picturing all this, here’s a Very Old Data Center:

Years before I ever got to elementary school, I was learning reading, writing, and ‘rithmetic from Charlie, a 286 running DOS. “Charlie,” mind you, was not a sweet nickname invented for a friend, it was the computer’s actual name on our LAN. For the most part, I was even able to launch Reader Rabbit from the command line myself, though I’d occasionally pester my dad with questions like “Where is the B?” and “Where did the W go?”

Eventually, I’d become master of the keyboard – and other peripherals. One day in kindergarten, my dad came in to tell the class about his job, and brought in a computer to do a demonstration. At one point, frustated watching a classmate struggling to use the mouse, I jumped in and angrily yanked it away from her. I simply couldn’t grasp that she had never even seen one before.

This is all a very roundabout way of saying that if, four paragraphs ago, you were wondering how a six-year-old boy ends up sounding like a grizzled sysadmin, you probably aren’t anymore.

It was today, still melancholic from the prior day’s letdown, that I truly reached the apex of my minimalistic period. Like a pint-size Frank Stella, I boiled the new computers that had just arrived down to their very essence, considering these mystical harbingers of the future from all angles and synthesizing them into their most basic form: a box.

“But Adam,” you retort, “surely you were just a six-year-old in a rush to turn in your journal?”

Nope. What I described is definitely what happened.

My phrasing here frames the apple picking as some distant eventual fruit-gathering quest deferred. In reality, it was (briefly) an annual tradition for my family. We’d make a picnic lunch and load into the car for a trip to a mythical land known to me only as “upstate”.

In apple picking, unlike programming, you definitely don’t want to get started on the low-hanging fruit. To that end, my dad had jury-rigged an impressive contraption from a telescoping painter’s pole and two paint paddles . With it, we could effectively beat the system, snatching fresh, virginal fruit from the tallest* branches, leaving the other visitors to scrounge for the few remaining apples dangling within arms length.

Apple picking likely ended up on the bucket list here as a coping mechanism. “Apple season” runs through the early autumn, and as November stretched along, I had probably recently received the news that we’d missed our window. “Maybe not this year, but one day,” I moped.

*18-20 feet