8 / Always Coming Home

Thank you for checking in! Thank you for being a friend!

Your boy has been winning for the last month, so I want to share these victories with you, to take my earned lap. If I don't call attention to them, who will?

I hosted my first book discussion recently, bringing a library group together to read Elaine Castillo's novel America Is Not The Heart. This is wild because I never pictured myself as someone who leads a book club, and up until 2025, I'd never joined one. I got to steam and bring a batch of puto for attendees, fitting for a novel about Filipino people and culture, both inseparable from Filipino food. I got to compile relevant links and Tagalog/Ilocano notes to provide everyone who signed up. And I got to put on a little bookcore outfit. More than half of the folks who came to the pop-up group turned out to be friends from other clubs. What a blessing, to have people show up for you.

Last week, I bench-pressed 200 lbs for a couple reps, a personal best! I stopped benching heavy -- and heavy is relative considering my modest build -- eight years ago at 190 lbs after another exercise tweaked my shoulder. I always regretted that I didn't make it to the 200 lb milestone, that I'd left business unfinished. I finally went for it after good progress on my lifts this year, and those two reps went up without much strain. I don't feel or look any stronger after all that, but I know that I can do it now. The strength is in feeling capable.

When I say I got that dog in me, this is what I mean.

Also, my team is in the NBA Finals, up 2-0 as this email finds you. I consider this a personal achievement, as many diehard Knicks fans must, because to devote oneself to a team through decades of disappointment and incompetent leadership, and to come out of that with one's heart and hope intact, is a triumph of stubborn resiliency. The world seems more colorful right now, saturated by the wild, unfamiliar joy of a down-trodden fanbase sharing their street celebrations online.

I attended a local watch party with fellow Knicks fans for Game 2, a certified hardwood classic decided in the final seconds. Relief and ecstasy took us over after our team's improbable win, midnight approaching. Strangers hugged, howled with joy, ran in circles, every cell alive. Someone's large Staffordshire Terrier, dressed in a Latrell Sprewell jersey, watched the spectacle, unsure why she was not home and in bed. I calmed the tired rescue as the crowd hollered around us, my palm brushing her gray head. I cheered to her with a quieter though no less jubilant voice, "Let's go Knicks. Let's go Knicks."

A few dope things that have been on my mind:

1. The Sundays at Commodore Ballroom, Vancouver, March 15th, 1993 - There is an ethereal quality to this performance, the band's last unarchived show until Luis's 90's Vault uploaded it two months ago. It's the color-filtered light cutting through the haze, the muddy video and audio you can't even complain about because it's a miracle we have this 33-year-old analog media at all. It's also the audience's silhouetted forms swaying, jumping, throwing their arms up, crowd-surfing at times. And it's Harriet Wheeler, a few years before she and her husband/bandmate David Gavurin would withdraw from the public eye, as she sings "Goodbye" and its parting line, "Oh well, just give me an easy life and a peaceful death."

2. Robert Johnson - "Cross Road Blues" (take 2, test pressing) - The clarity of this unearthed take of his legendary song is incredible. I first heard "Cross Road Blues" in my 7th grade music history class (shout-out Mr. Bowden), and it sounded exactly how you'd expect from a track recorded in 1936. The lore of Johnson's deal with the devil and the song's haunting, distant chords stayed with me. To hear this now, Johnson's voice and guitar crisp, feels as if someone struck another Faustian bargain. It's like hitting a cup of McDonald's fountain Coke after years of warm, caffeine-free Pepsi cans from your mom's garage.

3. This Victor Wembanyama quote - He speaks like a man beyond his 22 years, unsurprising from a a 7'5" basketball unicorn who trained with Shaolin monks and who helped start a book club with his Spurs teammates. Wemby drops gem after gem in his post-game interviews, as if plucking them from a high branch unreachable to anyone else without challenged effort. This response to critics who called him out for crying after a hard-fought match, though, is as tough as they come. Nevertheless, Knicks in 4.

♫ It's almost the end of the show ♫

If you are reading this message in your inbox, you can hit reply to send me a note. I'd like to hear from you! :D

8 / Always Coming Home

Credits: The title of this email comes from Ursula K. Le Guin's 1985 novel, while the lead image is a frame I paused at and found ghostly in the Sundays concert video I shared.

Shout-outs to my mom, who refused to buy any soft drinks in the 90s save for these gold cans of caffeine-free Pepsi. They tasted thin and stale even at the first sip, but kids will settle for any semblance of soda. I don't know why she kept these packs in our garage, but I have no memories of ever drinking one cold.

The Wembanyama quote comes courtesy of L'Équipe reporter Maxime Aubin. I must also call your attention to Karl-Anthony Towns's vulnerable post-game interviews, in which he speaks about the loss of his mother and remembering her as he plays in the NBA Finals.

And the Staffordshire Terrier goes by Eva. She has more photos on the Instagram account her family set up.