Giving up on something you love

In My Humble Opinion
1

In two separate threads, the one about the Beatles’ new release, and the one about baseball’s new rules Baseball rules changes 2023 - #29 by BlankSlate, both being things that I have devoted thousands of hours of rapturous attention to since 1963. I find a commonality: my very recent position on both is that I’m willing to stop being a fan of MLB and of the Beatles.

Both fanships, in the present moment, are of the qualities I used to love about them, not what I feel about their current states. That is, I’ll continue listening to the Beatles music and I’ll continue watching Baseball from the 1960s and 1970s, all the way past the turn of the century, but at some recent point, maybe 2010, maybe 2020, after years of maintaining my interest, it just died, and all I feel about both of them is nostalgia.

But I will go a bit further, because I’m not really talking about the Beatles or baseball. I’m talking about growth.

Maintaining a high level in anything after that thing has metamorphosed into something other than it was, and for the worse, is a poor reflection on one’s values, to my mind. Trying to be enthusiastic about the new Beatles’ release, when it’s IMO a pretty poor imitation of their music in its prime is self-deception. I feel better about acknowledging this truth (again, IMO–I’m not interested in debating here the quality of the new release. I do that plenty in the other thread) than I do about continuing to think of myself as an up-to-date fan of the Beatles.

I need to embrace the identity of an ex-fan, in other words, rather than identifying as a fan. It’s just a bad habit, and one that inhibits my personal growth.

Oddly, both fanships have been deteriorating for years. I stopped being quite so dewey-eyed about both music and sports in general when I became an adult, and over the decades of my adulthood, I have found more and more reasons to regard both interests critically and skeptically, and I think this tendency is a good one, but one that I resisted for a long time. I attended baseball games and rock concerts long after I first had the thought “I’m not enjoying this very much” because so much of my identity was as an ardent fan of each.

I haven’t attended either a game or a rock concert for quite a few years at this point, and I think that for me, this is a virtue. I’ve been able to develop an interest in other things and, though I miss being quite as passionate as I used to be about baseball. and the Beatles, I’m trying to accept this lacuna. I think it’s better for my character if I accept it as a loss rather than trying to maintain an interest I no longer feel. I’d like to be a fan, but if I’m not, I’m not, and there’s no use in bringing back to life something that’s died.

2

I am in the process of giving up football (soccer). FIFA, UEFA, Qatar, corruption at so many levels, at the level of my (formerly) beloved FC Barcelona (Barça!) and the arch-rival Real Madrid too, Messi getting old, Saudi Arabia getting the World Cup in 2034 (it is the sole candidate now, Au$traliy ha$ retracted their bid, nobody know$ why, so it will happen) and many other things too. Yes, I am turning my back to football. It is not easy, as many friends still talk about it, it is in the news, the bars I go to show games (I still watch, sometimes) and I know so much about the game and its history. It used to be important. It sometimes hurts a bit. But as you write yourself:

And it wasn’t me who’s killed it.
ETA: Still have not listened to the allegedly new Beatles song. For reasons like you stated. I am not even reading the thread about it. I mean: WTF?

3

For me, it’s comic books. I stopped reading new comics more than a decade ago and just read old comics. After ten years, I’ve exhausted anything of interest in the Golden Age (Thank you, https://comicbookplus.com/), and through back issues, trade paperbacks, and Marvel Unlimited, everything of interest in the Silver and Bronze ages. Every now and then I stumble across something I used to love like an unread Silver Age Lois Lane or an old EC Wally Wood story, but I struggle to even get to the end. So it’s not just that there’s nothing left to read; I’ve just somehow lost the passion I once had for the medium.

4

I think we all are allowed some space to grow during our lives, and allow interest in things to die as we evolve. Hanging-on by your fingernails to something because of nostalgia is exhausting - you need to let stuff go if it’s not doing it for you any more to make room for new things!

During my 40s I took up running. I really enjoyed it, and ran a bunch of 5K, 10K, and half-marathons, even one full marathon. I had not run at all before that, but the regular training and occasional events were fun for me. Toward the end it started becoming “not fun” and I was asking myself why I was not enjoying it as much. Training for events slowed way down, then stopped altogether. I told myself I just needed a break and would try to come back in a few months. Now, it’s been over 6 years since my last organized event, and while I have tried to get back, buying a new pair of running shoes last year and all, I just can’t get the interest back. I just gave myself permission to let it go.

5

What was that line: Surrender gracefully the things of youth?

Fandom, and especially youthful fandom is based on enthusiastic, innocent, and mostly unquestioning devotion to the Platonic Ideals that both music performance and sports performance advertise. It’s something pure and simple and above the fray of mere grubby commerce and beyond the mundanity of mere consumer / worker existence.

Which was bunk then and is bunk now. They’ve both been grubby businesses full of swindlers & braggarts since forever. The best performers don’t rise to the top and never did. Instead the good enough who are best positioned / connected rise to the top. The grubby business is omnipresent just off-stage and is pulling strings in every which way for their benefit, not fandom’s. It was ever thus.

If MLB was still playing by 1960 rules that would not help. The OP’s problem, IMO, is that he’s now a jaundiced older adult, not a starry eyed kid. It isn’t deeper than that.

Baseball isn’t especially unworthy of your time and attention now. You can still choose to enjoy it or be knowledgeable about it, or to be a big booster of your favorite team. What you can’t do is be that innocent kid of 50 years ago. The change isn’t in baseball. The change is in each of us. Yes, baseball has changed. But not in ways that truly matter for the OP’s issue.

As long as you’re finding fun in something, it’s OK that it’s not those things from your personal yesteryear. Novelty has a value all its own.

6

For me it’s writing, maybe. At least for now. I spent six years trying to be a productive writer. I spent two years learning about developmental editing and got involved in all sorts of programs with my friends. I have the talent, I have the drive and ability to grow my skillet, what I don’t have is an entrepreneurial bone in my body, and I don’t see how this works otherwise. I also have something wrong with my brain that just derails my ability to ship work. I edit endlessly. Endlessly. There was so much suffering that went into my craft.

Then I had a son during the pandemic. Then I was promoted to full time. Then I found out my kid is autistic and needs all these services and it’s a miracle I manage to balance work with all of his needs.

The thing is, I don’t want to write. I have no mental space in my life for that. I used to write grants for hours a day at work, then come home and work for hours a day at my fiction. I loved it then, but I had waaaay more free time back then. Do you know how great it is that I no longer have to work and be productive in my spare time? I can put together a puzzle instead. Something that’s just pure entertainment with no end goal beyond eventually, at some point, completing this puzzle. I don’t have to take classes to learn how to be better at puzzles or video games. I get to just be.

I’ve lost all of my writing communities. Most of my social life. A huge chunk of my identity is gone. I’m not sure what’s going to replace it yet. All I know is that there is no space for the old identity in my current life.

7

My fan-love is for Stephen King. However, I admit the magic’s been gone for a long time, and I don’t think it’ll come back. Partly it’s him, but partly it’s me…I can’t be amazed like I once was. I followed his career almost from the very first, being just the right age for it. I’ll still call myself a fan and buy his books for the rest of my life in gratitude for the joy he gave me.

8

I’m untroubled when I find myself losing enthusiasm for an artist. Very few creatives can endure, which is part of what makes them great.

The Beatles were most definitely of their time. I still love listening to them, but if they had continued on I have no doubt they would have lost their shine. I was a child when the original Star Wars trilogy began, the perfect age to interweave itself with my formative years. But of course, the prequels were dissatisfying.

That’s all OK. As much as I think George Lucas made some unforced errors, I’m deeply grateful for what he gave me and I still love watching the original Star Wars / Empire / Jedi films occasionally. This is normal, and I expect it.

I was one of the people in the baseball thread who was really disappointed. Sports isn’t the same as art, IMHO. While baseball has certainly evolved over time, I think the recent rules changes were a rather huge bridge too far. The traditions matter in baseball. I think modern baseball is like watching the prequels.

Perhaps that’s inconsistent of me. So be it, I like what I like. It’s also funny - I’m quite liberal in most respects, but when it comes to baseball I turn into William F. Buckley - “Stop all these damn changes!!!”

9

For me it’s definitely sports. My local NFL team is the one exception.

I’ve long ago lost interest in baseball. I was once a semi-avid hockey fan, but I realized recently that I can name just one player on “my” team.

I don’t think I’ll ever lose my fascination with the Beatles. Or Bob Dylan.

mmm

10

As I can see my demise in sight, I’ve had to deal with the question “Do I have enough life left for this?” When it comes to fandom of anything at all, I don’t. It becomes “enjoy it once or twice maybe but don’t obsess over it.” After decades of obsessing over certain musical artists, I’ve pretty much retired them all, never intending to listen to them again.

11

It sounds like the OP’s title really ought to have been

Giving up on something you loved

As in “it was special to me but now it’s not.” And there’s nothing wrong in that. The memories of the old enjoyment can remain special even if you can’t revisit that place completely. Just like the rest of life.

12

I’m pretty soured on radical feminism. Their inflexibility and lack of theoretical insight with their usual embrace of complexity on the subject of transgender women is surprising. For all that they were long regarded as “hating men” they wrote and said a lot of things about males within patriarchy that weren’t at all reducible to that, considerations about what it must be like to grow up male within patriarchy, about what our options were. But most of what was formerly called radical feminism is now positioned as gender-critical feminism and it is vehemently against transgender women and lacks all that thoughtful “look at where they’re coming from” analysis and is just hateful. I’m so disappointed.

13

I’m trying to grasp the full impact of your statement, which comes across somewhat like Yes lyrics to me, but maybe that’s my issue.

Basically I’m soured on it too, but it’s for the simple fact that trans people do have a high suicide rate. I don’t see any compassion in the radical feminism stance. It comes across to me as “the world isn’t like I would have it, so I’m going scream about it” and I can’t think of anything more shortsighted than that. In my world if this human being says they’re a woman they’re a woman. If that human being says they’re somewhere in the middle, they’re somewhere in the middle. I’m left to deal with their reality, and while my response is not their problem, some frequently believe it is indeed their problem.

14

For me it is video games. When I was younger I couldn’t wait to get back to my current game. Now, even when I do pick up a game, I might play for an hour or two, and then I just don’t ever go back to it.

As a kid I could play the simplistic and crap games on the Atari 2600 and Nintendo for days. As I got older games got better. Which games I liked got a bit more focused, but the ones I liked I could still spend weeks with.

As I got even older the games I actually liked playing got fewer and fewer. Now I don’t play any. I’d like to play, but I don’t have the patience to put in 20+ hours to get good at complex games, and casual games tend to be pay to win or, to me, just endless grinding.

15

I spent a few moments thinking about putting that “d” in there.

But I still love the Beatles and I still love baseball. In much the same way, in fact, that I still love my ex-wife, whom I would go to great trouble to avoid ever seeing or speaking to again. That is to say, I still love the memories I have of loving all these different experiences, and I can still listen to Beatles’ music and to watching clips of the 1966 All-Star game or remember conversations with my ex- when we were first getting to know each other, all of which fill me with joy. It’s just that I’ve given up on all of their present incarnations, which just sadden me.

In a sense, I’m coming to grips with the understanding that, if I try to take joy in the present incarnations, I’m lying to myself, I’m making believe that they still exist in the form I used to love, so I refuse to entertain those illusions, though it hurts me to do so. That pain is good because it’s true, it’s honest.

16

For decades I was a gung-ho supporter of the Washington Football Team. (American Football, that is.) This went all the way back to the early 1970’s, and continued well into the Oughts.

My support wavered as I grew old enough to understand that the team name was offensive, and I started referring to it as the “Washington Football Team” fifteen years before anyone else did.

Then the new owner came along, and he was just an all-around sleazebag, and I stopped purchasing tickets or merchandise, because I didn’t want to support him personally financially.

But the nail in the coffin was when I read about the long-term effects of repeated blows to the head on the players. The terrible suffering and neurological damage was a surprise to me.

I had always known that players suffered injuries. I was watching when Joe Theismann’s leg broke, and I had seen Riggins at events after back pain ended his career. But when I learned that these men were losing themSELVES, that their brains were gone, that’s when I could not, in good conscience, watch another game, ever.

And I haven’t.

17

Very well said.

Loving the memories is called nostalgia. Which is always a poignant emotion of both happiness for what was, and sadness for what is no longer. As we grow older and more sophisticated in our ways of thinking & feeling, not only do we have more past to ruminate over, but we can also savor it from a place of greater experience. Which IME/IMO makes the sadness part loom relatively larger.

The flavor isn’t worse, just different. Kinda like abandoning kid cola for college-age beer, and 20 years later actual grown-up Scotch, at each transition it’s a bit of an acquired taste.

Whether you’re recognizing that baseball itself is different, or that your reaction to baseball is different, in either case it is a change. And congrats for noticing it and labeling it accurately, and accepting it for what it is. Better that than to obliviously pour your hours into it not quite recognizing that it tastes like cardboard now.


I personally am one of those dismal folks who never had much enthusiasm for anything. I enjoy many things, but they’ve all always been at the “take it or leave it” level. “I can hardly wait to …” was never part of my vocabulary. As I become older and lazier that’s an easy recipe for couch potato-hood. Which is uncomfortable to think about.

The few really celebratory things I used to do now ring sorta hollow, and as you said so well: “I refuse to entertain those illusions, though it hurts me to do so. That pain is good because it’s true, it’s honest.” Doesn’t mean it doesn’t still hurt though.

18

Back around 1993, so long before the concussion awareness I met a tragic man who’d been a lineman for the Bears in their golden era. He had been a Force of Nature in the NFL. He was 45-50yo, vigorous of manner, very large, built like a rock but now an overweight padded rock. And he could barely walk.

He was selling the beautiful horse farm in the lovely countryside that he had built as his dream home. It had everything a man or horseman could want. Then his legs quit and he could not enjoy anything about the place. So he rode his electric power-chair around the paths, with his walker on the back for when he had stand or take a few steps where the chair could not drive.

His mind was fine. His body was arthritic everywhere and his knees and ankles and hips were beyond shot. His days consisted of sitting in pain and contemplating what he gave up to play the game and earn the money that built this beautiful place.

We did not buy his farm. We wished him well at the end of his tour and sales pitch and drove away. The pathos of his situation took a long time for us to get over. The NFL has never been the same for me. Those aren’t robots inside all that gear.

19

I’ve been a fan for a long time, but his latest release is so different from everything else he’s written. Kinda a bummer.

As an aside, in ~1985 I was in a book club at the University of Pittsburgh. Through some crazy coincidences I was able to get Stephen King to stop in and talk to a small group of fans. Then a major snowstorm happened and his flight got diverted. :frowning:

20

Oh no, that’s terrible!
I’ve never had a chance to meet the man, but we stopped by his house when we visited Bangor.