If you meet Miss Awesome, go all in

One of my first tastes of country music was when my dad blared Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler” on his turntable record player.

In the famous ditty that uses a card game as a metaphor for how to find contentment in life, Rogers croons: “You got to know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away, know when to run.”

However, he doesn’t mention the gutsy move of going all in; laying all your money and poker acumen on the line in one hand. And that’s too bad. Every so often, I think we need to slide all our chips to the center of the table. Even if we fail, and especially if we fail, it’s a worthwhile endeavor.

And, as I learned recently, the prime time to apply the “all in” mindset is when you’re bowled over by an unexpected romantic prospect.

As I’ve aged, the love-at-first-sight, Cupid’s-arrow-is-out-there view of romance (see Colin Firth’s storyline in “Love Actually”) has been slowly replaced by my increasing belief that the dating world is an absurd version of the game “Telephone.” Misinterpretations run rampant. Finding the “same page” is a frustratingly elusive exercise.

With all that built-up cynicism, what can possibly thaw a heart hardened by the ghosts of romances past?

My answer: Upon meeting someone who arrests your attention and enters a daydream or two, act on it.

Do it. Put yourself out there, without the foggiest idea of how your interest feels. Stop waiting for all the stars to align. Life is not a Disney movie. If you’re like me, and naysaying voices constantly rattle around in your mind, intent on dissuading you, tell them to shut up.

I channeled this sentiment recently and was shot down. She was fun, sunshiney, with my kind of substance. And extremely awesome. The timing, however, was not.

But I tried. As hard as I could. I brought out the big guns, in all their awkward glory. And I’m very glad I did. 100% worth the initial sinking feeling of getting handed the “friend card.”

Exposing yourself to rejection is hard to do. Pride is probably the hardest thing to gamble away. But even more difficult is living with that unfinished feeling in your gut and ignoring the hunch that she might be “The One.”

So get over yourself and your insecurities. Go all in once in a while. Win or lose – and more often than not you’ll lose – you might learn a thing or two about yourself.

When did St. Patrick’s Day go viral?

I received two mass text messages yesterday wishing me a “Happy St. Patrick’s Day.” I barely get that many texts on my birthday.

My point?

Call me a party pooper or a curmudgeon, but those mass texts crystallized for me the fact that St. Patrick’s Day has entered the “Overly hyped quasi-holiday” realm. Valentine’s Day now has company.

Did I have a few Guinesses in honor of my Great Grandmother Ryan, who hailed from Cork, Ireland? You betcha.

But I feel as though the whole month of March has been colored green. In Ireland, March 17 is actually a holy day of obligation, meaning Catholics are strongly encouraged to attend church. I doubt that they’re swigging green Bud Light in the pews.

Meanwhile, people on this side of the pond do it a little differently. I saw a few people at the local Irish pub last night wearing a shirt saying, “Drink until you’re Irish.” That’s one way to pay homage.

Will the Irish-for-a-day-craze ever die down? Not a chance. And if I were Hallmark or a beer company, I’d milk March 17 for all it’s worth, too. It’s the capitalistic way.

But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

Calvin Coolidge doesn't belong in the card game "Kings"

If someone drew the “categories” card during a game of “Kings” and chose to go with the popular “Obscure U.S. Presidents” theme, I must admit that Calvin Coolidge would always be on the tip of my tongue. After all, they called him “Silent Cal.”

But I recently stumbled upon a speech that Coolidge gave which will stop me from dropping his name during the next “Kings” game. I’ll use Chester Arthur instead. What a do-nothing.

Before I gush about Mr. Coolidge, indulge me in a swim to the deep end for a bit.

I’ve learned a few things in my 26 years. Among them is this: If you work really hard and are kind to people, good things happen. Period. Natural talent, IQ level and the school on your diploma are all secondary to that. And these “good things” may not come in the romanticized form you had envisioned when you were watching butterflies flutter during a sunset, but when does everything go as planned?

Our 30th President understood that and said it much more cogently than I ever could.

A search on the Web for when and where Mr. Coolidge uttered these words yields nothing definitive, but those details hardly matter.

What matters is how true these words will always be. And you can only appreciate them after you’ve felt the unsuspecting upper cuts and sneaky left hooks that life throws at you.

Yep, Coolidge would have been a good boxer. Here's why:

“Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; the world is full of unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan ‘Press on’ has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.”

It's like the "Rocky" soundtrack for the eyes, isn't it?

"When do I get mine?"

As I walked out of work on a recent Friday evening, a long-time high school buddy who I hear from sporadically called me in a state of panic.

"There’s something missing,” he said, desperation hurrying his speech. “What am I not doing?” he asked, verbally unfurling a white flag.

My afflicted friend explained that his “checklist to success” was almost completely filled with pencil marks: A good job that provides financial security? Check. Successfully breaking dependencies from the parents? Done. Volunteer work for the greater good? Nearly every Saturday morning. Consistent gym attendance? Yep, more fit than ever.

Yet despite the cross-offs, satisfaction eluded him at that moment. Discouragement invaded a usually self-assured twentysomething.

I wanted to reply with an answer to end all questions. I wanted to assure him that permanent contentment was just around the corner. I wanted to confidently shrug off his worries and tell him to burn the white flag.

But I couldn’t, because I was burdened by the same questions.

“When do I get mine?” he asked. “When does playing by the rules start paying off?”

Despite my own question marks, I channeled my inner Rocky and crafted a motivational monologue full of clichés and hope-filled crescendos. The phone call ended on a high note, but my friend’s questions rattled around in my mind for a while: When do I get mine?

After many iPod-less jogs and daydreams, I’ve realized that my friend is asking the wrong question. Framing it as a “when” assumes that at some point, a neat package will arrive in his mailbox that extinguishes all doubt, all worries, all of the “suck” that life spews out.

That package doesn’t exist. There is no definitive “arrival time.” Although it might comfort us to think that fulfillment can be boiled down to completing the steps of a formula, it’s never that clear-cut.

And maybe that’s a good thing. If there were such a package of indisputable answers, what would we do after we read them? Quit taking risks? Shut ourselves off from all potential fun? Or would we reach personal nirvana?

I don’t know. I never will know for sure. And I’m OK with that.

But I’m not going to sit on my stoop waiting for some package. There’s too much out there to do.

Fitness club folly...

If you’re young, single and your keyster spends a good part of the week parked in an office chair, chances are you try to fight off the office slug love handles with a gym membership.

I count myself as one such card carrier.

However, I was reluctant to join the club of gym rats and neurotic sweat fiends, fearing that a Globo Gym might turn me into a hamster on a wheel and cut into my outside jaunts through the neighborhood.

That fear quickly subsided as I flashed my shiny new membership card to the excessively cheery front desk lady during the first visit to my new sweat shop. Little did I know that the gym is such a party for curious eyes. How can anyone get a workout in with so much hilarity surrounding you?

When you actually unplug your ear buds, stop counting curls and take a peak around, the gym becomes a breeding ground for comedy.

There’s the bookish, gray-haired lady with 3-inch thick glasses clutching her 300-page novel as she walks in circles around the indoor track. How she manages to stay in her lane, flip the pages and retain what she reads is a tight-rope act that puts Ringling Brothers to shame.

And shame is the first feeling that pierces my cerebellum when I see a fortysomething man, glued to a Nautilus machine, sweating through a pair of jeans. One of the unwritten Golden Rules of Sport is: Never wear jeans to Little League practice, never wear jeans in high school gym class, and never, ever wear jeans to the gym. It screams incompetence. You could be one of the most uncoordinated, weak, stamina-less lots in the building, but if you rock Nike cross trainers, mesh shorts and a charity 5k T-shirt, your struggles with chest presses are glossed over. But by wearing jeans, judging eyes might stare you to death on the Stairmaster.

On the other end of the fashion spectrum is the Sweatinistas, a breed of young female, most likely single and most definitely attention-craving, who hop on treadmills and ellipticals dolled up like they are headed to Prom. Earrings sway, pearl necklaces dangle and eyeliner inexplicably avoids bleeding. I find myself conflicted: My inner monologue flows with snarky quips at the sight of the overly decorated Sweatinista, but, at the same time, I appreciate the outward display of bachelorettehood. If I wasn’t drenched in sweat and gym stink, I might float a suave comment her way at the water fountain…

However, one species of gym dweller I avoid approaching is the Woahmen. Woahmen are defined as fortysomething ladies who work out under the illusion that wearing spandex and tank tops designed for their granddaughters is a good idea. Listen Woahmen, as much as I try to sympathize with your struggles to let go of youth, wearing more loose-fitting apparel might allow for a more pleasant gym outing for all of us. Outside the gym, our culture has been oddly celebrating your lust for Round 2 of your twenties by calling it “Cougarhood.” Inside the gym, you’re just nasty.

Then there’s the thirtysomething behemoth at the bench press who you swear you saw hauling school buses over his shoulder on ESPN. With each lift, this brute fills the whole room with grunts of primal manliness. He’s the obvious king of this kingdom, and the unspoken “There’s no crying in fitness clubs” rule does not apply to him. You catch yourself daydreaming a walk down the street in his shoes for a fleeting second, but then common sense prevails: What woman would ever want to date a guy who could toss her car up the block when they argue?

The breed of gym dweller who I always want to reward with a head nod of respect in between reps is Joe. Joe is that guy or gal who never wastes a second of gym time, whose sweat forms a small pool of hard work next to him/her. Joe doesn’t flaunt a wife beater or a two-piece bathing suit, but rather a plain white T-shirt and a bland pair of Russell Athletic shorts. Joe smiles and might say hi at the water fountain. Joe is not spellbound by his/her muscle mass, nor preoccupied with the contour of his/her glutes. At any moment, Joe might mouth the words to the song playing on his/her iPod. Joe knows that, despite popular opinion, life won’t be much easier even with a tight six pack, so he/she does 100 crunches rather than 400.

Here’s to you, Joe, for making me feel welcome in a world filled with such odd creatures.

Why is the media enabling Blagojevich?

I have found a new, hard-to-pronounce reason to never become a politician: Blagojevich.

The former Illinois governor’s wicked intention to “sell” a vacant U.S. Senate seat is trumped only by his narcissistic megalomania and pathological lying, played out in the public square recently thanks to ratings-craving TV news producers.

As he was taken from his home on Dec. 9 by federal agents, he told NBC, “I thought about Mandela, Dr. King and Gandhi and tried to put some perspective to all this, and that is what I am doing now.”

This wackjob sounds like a dream case study for a psychology student.

The Illinois Senate voted 59-0 not only to impeach Blagojevich as governor, but barred him from ever holding public office in the state again.

With such a firm repudiation, I cannot, for the life of me, understand why reputable media outlets were validating this man with a platform through which to feed his delusions and further tarnish the sometimes questionable credibility of American politics.

ABC’s “Nightline, CNN’s “Larry King Live” and several other supposed bastions of principled journalism featured Blagojevich in extensive interviews on telecasts in the days leading up to the decision on his impeachment.

I understand the Shakespearean tragedy and morbid fascination surrounding a U.S. governor gone corrupt. But with the unemployment rate in the country rising past 7% and with the government set to write a $800+ billion stimulus check funded with taxpayer dollars, so much journalistic energy should not have been spent on Blago from Chicago.

A two-minute summary of his trial and a few comments from the man would have sufficed. The fact that he has been elevated to an iconic status – which was exactly his sick intention – is sad.

Warren Buffet, the pragmatic billionaire investor, once said: “To a degree, people read the press to inform themselves, and the better the teacher, the better the student body.”

If the teacher is distracted by a corrupt politician with a bad hair cut and missing moral fibers, how are the students supposed to know what is important to learn?

Drowning in a new kind of patriotism

The piercing ring of the cell phone in my ear at 4:30 a.m. was not caused by a giddy friend who wanted to restate in a slurred shout his undying man crush on me as he stumbled home from an after-after party.

The noise was actually planned, and the phone alarm sprung me from a makeshift bed that laid on the ground of a friend’s house in Dupont, a short jog away from where Barack Obama would stand at a podium later that morning, and, in so doing, write a paragraph in the next edition of grade-school history textbooks.

I felt compelled to travel to Washington not as a masochist who enjoys traffic jams or moving five feet in 30 minutes among a sea of people. I also didn’t make the trip to rustle my pom-poms for the home team, even though I did vote for Mr. Obama.

I endured the mayhem and the nostril-numbing cold to see why everyone else was there.

Standing on the National Mall at 6:30 a.m., knowing there were four hours until the festivities kicked off, I realized I had a lot of time to search for my answer...

Two friends from Brazil who recently opened an eatery in the area were there to celebrate the induction of a more global U.S. President.

White twentysomethings who were high school friends from Pennsylvania reunited to see a politician who had inspired them to become more participatory in government.

A black family from Alabama braved a long bus ride to see a man who reflected a new beginning for them. Tears would later trickle down the faces of the mother and father as Obama spoke of how “a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.”

I was particularly struck by the fierce sense of pride black families displayed, shown by the portraits of the Obama family they wore on shirts and the sense of ownership they asserted through their language. Jan. 20 was more than an event on their calendar; it was an obligation, a celebration, a vindication.

The most poignant and telling moment of the weekend for me came on Inauguration Eve, when I was strolling around the Capitol, drinking in the pre-game vibe.

A young black boy, no older than four, was playfully running in circles near the front steps of the building when his father yelled to him.

“Come on, buddy, we need to get to our hotel,” Dad said. “Tomorrow’s going to be a big day for all of us, and you’re going to be able to say you were here to see it.”

The expectations placed on President Obama, especially from the black community and sometimes from media members intoxicated by romanticism, are astronomically high, to the point of being unfair.

But the man does signal a profound changing of the guard in America. The disparity between older and younger voters in the 2008 presidential election was the widest ever recorded, according to a recent Newsweek story. In addition, by 2050, whites will make up only 47% of the U.S. population, the same story reported.

And that young black boy I saw on the steps of the Capitol who is a part of this shift will have at least one role model to channel motivation from.

As I surveyed the crowd on the National Mall that morning, I realized that some have already started channeling. And that can only be a good thing.