What are you getting?

Joe and I fell in love over a meal... or maybe a few more than that, but food certainly was and is a huge factor in our marriage. For this reason, we don’t take eating together lightly. We aren’t just going to swing through some franchise fast food place to grab dinner or worse yet, pour a bowl of cereal. Forget that noise. Oh, no. If there is food to be had, we want to eat at a place that we won’t soon forget.

The challenge? Minor league baseball teams are not in towns found in the Zagat guide.

First challenge: Clearwater, FL
Joe has Spring Training here. It is a short drive from Tampa, which is great in terms of getting to. The same cannot be said for the AA and AAA teams.

Below I have gone through the most important food stops in the Clearwater Beach area.

Breakfast: 
Lenny’s : Lenny’s is your typical diner. Big haired waitresses waiting for their cigarette breaks, syrup in the perpetually sticky pourers, signed baseball paraphernalia on the wall and eggs more ways than you can think of. The danish basket alone is worth it. They will make your omlette however you want and the waffles are delish, too. Joe and I usually team eat in order to get equal parts salty and sweet in our caloric indulgence. These people are beyond kind to Joe when he goes in alone about 5 days a week and does the USA Today crossword puzzle in a booth. 

Clear Sky Cafe: The French toast here is the best I have ever had. And I have eaten a LOT of French toast. Huevos Rancheros eggs are also amazing here. Notice how multicultural I am in my dining experience. I do not discriminate any food, except salad. Anyways, this place is great. Outdoor seating, which is nice in pleasent weather. Fill up a big coffee cup and eat till you start saying things like, “Merci beaucoup for la toast de France y los eggs de ranchos.”*  

The French Toast pictured is the Java flavor. No breakfast is complete without coffee. Heck, no day is complete without coffee.

Java French toast with cinnamon butter 

Lunch: St. Petersburg Italian Market is the place to go if you want bread with the consistency of a cloud and melted cheese and peppers in your mouth, than you need to go eat here. The Philly cheese steak with chicken is my favorite sandwich-- ever. Italians know food, they take pride in their food, and the Italian Market is very worthy of Italian pride. Get yourself some coffee made from the big copper coffee maker, sit at the bar and watch the pastry chefs make beautiful little sugary treats. 

Started eating the cheese steak before I thought to take a picture 

After your cheese steak or pizza panini (yeah, you read that right. It is a special item so cross your fingers it is there ), get a canoli and another cup of coffee and some gelato.  Real gelato, not ice cream that is calling itself gelato. Pisachio is a standard favorite (pictures below), but Nutella and Frutti de Bosco are other top choices of mine. Joe and I have sat here for hours. If there is one thing to look forward to in Spring Training, it is knowing I will go eat at the Italian Market. 

Pistachio gelato, don't let the color intimidate. Or do, more gelato for me than. 

Dinner: Ceviche
A totally random find, but a freaking gem. Joe and I Googled this place and thought, yeah, sounds better than Hooters (the original Hooters is in Clearwater, less than a mile from the field. Thank you for playing to stereotypes about athletes). It is tapas, meaning basically appetizers, meaning team eating at its finest. Get a sangria wine and begin a Spanish feast. The filetito is to die for. Beef, peppers, goat cheesed, toasted bread-- so simple, yet so tantalizing. Then get the piquenos rellenos. They are red peppers full of cheese, chorizo and veal. You just about want to get into the pepper yourself. The fish and garlic grilled shrimp is wonderful, though I personally think you have to get fish if you are in a place that you can see the ocean. Try the frog legs, too. I know eating Kermit sounds daunting, but it is totally worth it. They're fried and an old sock would taste good fried. So go to Ceviche if you are ever in the Tampa Bay area. Just tell them Jen sent you.

Actually, don’t because they don’t know who I am. But maybe one day I will be greeted at the door with a bouquet of stuffed peppers and a box of filetitos. 

After a delicious, gluttonous weekend, the time has come to return to Houston. You know when you don't care about PDA? When you're saying good-bye. Nor do you care about crying in public, Public Displays of Sadness? Of tears? Something like that. Even now, thinking about waking up tomorrow a thousand miles apart makes my eyes sting. 

Joe and I were very intentional on taking counseling classes with the church. We read stacks of books about being married and took compatibility quizzes. And they were very insightful. But I haven't found one that answers the questions we are faced with within this lifestyle. So tonight, belly and heart empty, I go to sleep praying to find a way to take on marriage from a distance and for sweet dreams of eating french toast and cheese steaks with Joe. 

* I am aware that this is a grotesque combination of two languages. I chose to write this for comedic effect, I don't actually think this makes any real sense.

When I Was Your Age

If given a chance to take back some mistakes, I think most of us would take back things from our four years we each spent in high school. Poor choices in study habits, peer pressure, romantic relationships or attempted romantic relationships and even fashion-- yes, looking back at high school sometimes seems a parade of our most glossy mistakes.

Which makes it very fun to teach high school and watch all of these same mistakes being made. And by fun I mean difficult, stressful, insightful and maturing.

In short, I feel like I am doing an improvisational comedy show five days a week.

Some highlights of this, my first year teaching, thus far:

I proudly typed my syllabus and course objectives, wording it to make sure that the class seemed rigorous and I seemed strict and intimidating. I tried to hide any evidence of my youthfulness since my mere presence spoke for itself.  People told me not to smile for the first quarter; some said year, some said month--- but the general message was don’t smile. The bell rang for my first class on my first day in my first “real job.” I handed out the syllabus and gave the same verbal overview to all of my classes: I will reward hard work, but I will punish laziness, you must read the material, writing does not have a formula, you will respect each other and me, you will not get off task on your laptop, you do not “get” grades-- you earn them. I finished my lecture, lips tightly closed over my teeth, and asked if there were any questions. A few brave hands shoot up:

“Is it true you are dating a professional baseball player?”
“What was it like being in a sorority at Ole Miss?”
“Did you like SEC football?”

And my favorite:
“Are your shoes Christian Louboutin?”

I garnered their respect from the start.

When I got the job, I was ecstatic. I had wanted to teach high school English since I was taking high school English. There was the promise of a creative writing course in the future, too. I was thrilled to mold and shape students the way I had been by my amazing and engaging English teachers. I was proud to tell people when they asked what I was doing after graduation, “teaching” “Oh, what age?” “Sophomores and juniors” “High schoolers?!” “Yes...?” “Those boys are going to be all over you.”

Gross. I decided this was a myth, something made up by Britney Spears music videos and The O.C. I wouldn’t have students like that. They would see me for my brain and my brain only.

For the most part I was right, I was able to sass back at them and gave them a seating chart and graded them hard enough on their first paper to prove whatever it was I needed to prove to them. But there is something about boys ages 14-23 (yes, I realize the giant age bracket and that it includes guys my age) that makes them nearly intolerable.

Around homecoming, this particular student came in my room and asked if I would wear his jersey on Homecoming Friday. “What in the world? Are you trying to get me fired? I don’t think you should ask things like that!!” He responded that all the teachers do it, it is a tradition. Tradition my left foot! I quickly e-mailed my other young teacher friends and it was confirmed that teachers do wear players’ jerseys, but that asking on MONDAY of Homecoming week was jumping the gun a little bit. Even though all the other teachers had on jerseys, it still felt a little weird.

Something that really makes my day, and by that I mean makes me really insecure, is being mistook for a student. Moms do this a lot. Of course, they themselves can often times look like students, or at least much closer to my age. Yes, hot-tennis-mom is not a creation of the writers for Desperate Housewives, they exist in the real world. Bless them for not working and being able to do so much for the school (luncheons, goodybags, breakfasts, cupcakes-- seriously, they take care of us and we would be a public school without them), but I would appreciate you recognizing, if nothing else, I am in a pencil skirt and a blazer-- the kids are in jeans and flip-flops.

These same well-meaning parents have had some glorious comments such as:
Laziness is a learning disability, my son has it and you need to be sensitive to it*
I know that all the assignments are online, but could you e-mail me what they are everyday?
My son will be grounded if he doesn’t have an A, I just think you should take that into consideration when grading.
Do you think you could change the research paper from Macbeth to the play they read last year because I know my daughter read that one?
My daughter said I needed to come to Parent Night to see your shoes, she said that is all she looks at in class.

In closing:
Our boss told us this quote in our first faculty meeting : It is the job of the parent to prepare the child for the path, not prepare the path for the child. I love this because it can translate to so many other aspects of life. How often do we want to change our circumstances before we admit we need to change ourselves? A LOT.

I hope I am helping prepare each child.

And if not, well, at least I tried while wearing great shoes.

*This was not said directly to me, but I heard from an eye witness.

The Shortest Distance Between Two People (and cheesy things like that)

I love how my head fits in the slope of Joe's neck and shoulder. I don't believe in "The One," but simple things like puzzle piece body parts make it very clear God places people in our lives  for a purpose. Joe's purpose is for me to lay my head on his chest-- the soft ba-dum of his heartbeat in my ear and his voice to seeming to echo off of it-- and feel at home there forever and ever.

Except  baseball season takes him 1,000 miles away.

A month into our marriage, this time has come. I will not sugar coat my feelings and say things about being stronger and "the course of true love never did run smooth"* I won't, because being away from him physically hurts. If you have ever come off of serious painkillers, the slow disorientating lull-ish pain, that's what it feels like being apart. A feeling that grew familiar with our dating last season, but seems to have amplified in some culmination of the newness of our marriage and the flouting of the distance in the off season.

I wish I had found this for our cake

I once told Joe that it seems better to remain small to the world, this is after seeing Country Strong**. I told him that in trying to be big to the world, or rather maintaining this status was the tragic flaw of people-- and the tragic flaw of our society for perpetuating it. What love does, though, is make your world shrink to a beautiful microcosm between you and that person. You are big to them, they to you, and that is all that matters. If you can find this in another person: be willing to admit every flaw you have, forgive them for all of their flaws, be willing to admit all the things you want and then put everything they need as a higher importance. It's that simple.  None of the "I deserve this" or "I have a right." No, it isn't about your rights-- it's a servantile love that mirrors the love of God, and the kind of love that lasts.  Romantic comedies, women's magazines and society's definition of success tells us to demand, tells us we deserve something from someone. God tells us to give ourselves and our needs up to take up another's cross.

This is all to say that baseball season has a specific cross to bear with it. So though I curse the distance, Joe is called to be there. And I know his Christian presence has to change people, his example has to affect and inspire. I can affect and inspire by supporting my husband and respecting him and loving him more than myself, which I do--

          And in the end, my head is on his shoulder no matter where we sleep at night.


Happy one month anniversary to the love of my life. You inspire me and build me up when I fall. I pray I do the same for you, always.

* quote from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. One of the most misunderstood quotes in Shakespeare. I'll explain another time, however.

** great movie starting Gweneth Paltrow. You have to watch it understanding what we do to each other as human beings, in the public and private spheres of life.



All photos except cake toppers courtesy of Kelly Hornberger Photography 

Opening Day

Playing in the minor leagues tries men (and their wives) in ways that seem only comparable to the military. Playing in the minor leagues for your fourth season when you were a first round draft pick tries your belief in not just the game, but in your ability, your purpose and your very being. So when Joe began the 2010 season a 25 year old first rounder back in high A ball, he questioned if baseball was worth the high price he seemed to be paying. 

Joe's parents and my father went to college together. We had known each other, and been pushed to date, for several years. When we did start dating, Joe made a career change from a starting pitcher to a position player and ended up in the humid, hot sun of Clearwater, FL. Joe put up video game-like numbers his first month as a hitter, I am talking an average of 621. He cooled off in May and cooled way off in June. One night, the Clearwater Threshers played in a 21 inning game and put Joe on the mound, simply because they ran out of guys in the bullpen. That night, he threw a 94 mph fast ball and an 87 mph slider. Something in his arm started working again and he was moved up to AA at the end of June. Joe continued to keep consistent numbers in the mid 90's. I was finally able to go join him in July and after only 3 weeks in AA, they told him to put up the bat for good and sent him up to be a Lehigh Valley Iron Pig, the Phillies AAA afflliate. 

I was "just a girlfriend" for the 2011 season. I put that term in quotations because that is the way we, the non-wives*, were made to feel at times; as if our dedication didn't mean as much because were weren't married. What it really meant, was that trying to take time out of my life, job, school was even harder because it was for "just a boyfriend". So to all the girlfriends out there, I commend you and your dedication to your man. 

 I was finishing my senior year at Ole Miss and it seemed that every opportunity for our plans to fall through, they crashed to the ground. We cancelled trips, paid extra to try and get on different flights, hugged good-bye next to the bus after only seeing each other for 3 hours because they decided to change the game schedule..... you get what I am trying to say. Our relationship was tested and our (my) patience wore thin. Joe is the most patient, loving man I know, but his faith is my favorite thing about him. God bless all the men whom Joe works with that he can talk to and pray with, and God bless his spiritual leadership with me through the many uncertainties of the season. Come September, being together every day was going to be a luxury; but getting through the season together allowed us to see that baseball will come and go, but we had staying power. 

Joe's team progressed to the league finals in September, thus prolonging his eventual return to Houston (much to my chagrin). On the last night of the series, I flew into Philadelphia expecting to begin the long drive back to Texas.  While I was in the air, the Phillies promoted Joe as a late September call up. On September 17, 2011, Joe dressed in his Phillies uniform and his brother, my dad and I watched him from the stands at Citizens Bank Park. Phillies clenched the NL East that night and Joe sprayed champagne in the locker room his first night as a major leaguer. The families gathered on the field and we got to see Joe in his soaked NL East Champions shirt and hat, freezing and smiling. About an hour and a half later, Joe proposed in our hotel room. My dad and his brother waited in the hotel restaurant with champagne, to which Joe toasted, "Well, Jen, I got called up and we got engaged. I think it is all downhill from here!" 

Here is hoping that it is just the start! 

We married January 14, 2012. Our wedding was amazing and so wonderful. If you are reading this and were a guest, we thank you. We could not have hoped for a better night! Everything was navy, ivory and silver with tons of candlelight, breakfast food and a band to knock your socks off... or split your rented tux pants down the crotch seam, which is what happened to one of Joe's groomsman. Best. Night. Ever. Best man to marry ever!  

Basically how we looked all night. Notice my beautiful friends and mother behind us.
Thanks, Kelly Hornberger Photography  

Now, a month later,  Joe will leave for Spring Training. Part of the 40 Man, we don't know what this season holds for Joe. I will remain in Houston teaching high school English until summer and then go travel with him and our 4 month old Corgi, Polly Pocket. 

Baseball life creates a tumultuous juxtaposition of monotony and spontaneity. Joe will do basically the same thing everyday until, at the drop of a hat (or ERA), he gets moved to a new town, new team. Until June, Joe and I will take on the long distance marriage, something I am certain I will not recommend trying, let alone trying as a newlywed. 

It will not be without prayer, faith and trust in God and each other that we take on this season.

Joe, me and our "child," Polly

Thus, here I am entering the blogging world. Stay tuned, this season has only just begun.....


















































* Now a wife, I promise to be as nice as I can to all the girls I meet. Be she a wife, girlfriend, fiance, side-beef or one night stand-- I will be her friend because it can be pretty boring in those stands alone. 


** Background photo courtesy of Kelly Hornberger Photography-- check her blog out, too!