Astros and life. One and the same?

So again I have strayed from updating my blog.  It gets so easy to forget about this site.  Life gets busy, Bills are due, Events get planned, etc.

The 2016 Major League Baseball season has started and with it comes a sense of spring and renewal.  No matter how my team is projected to finish the year, Opening Day has always been special to me.  Unfortunately I was unable to attend this year though as it was on a Monday.  Every team starts out at 0-0 so no matter if you have a lineup full of stars or scrubs, it gives fans the illusion that this could be the year! Baseball is back! It's springtime!

Like I said above, I feel a sense of renewal every year around this time.  Usually Easter is around the same time (It was early this year), the trees begin blooming again.  The weather gets warmer and I get to put my coats and jackets back in the closet.  It allows me a time to reflect on myself as well.  What am I doing well in my life? What am I struggling with?

I feel I've come a long way as far as my psych meds go.  For the first time in my life, I feel like the medicine I am on is actually doing something and I feel life is more balanced.  I probably haven't felt this good since college.  My self esteem has improved and I am going out more than just staying in.  I've started taking guitar lessons finally and they are coming along great.  I feel my love of music has returned.

Not everything has been coming up Milhouse though (Simpsons reference).  I've struggled with drinking lately.  And I've become more rude to some friends and less religious.  I tried to pray the rosary last week and only got halfway through the week before giving up.

I know that God has a plan for my life but right now, it's so difficult to see the road ahead.  I don't know what the future holds for me.  I'm not depressed and suicidal like I have been in the past, but I just feel kind of hopeless right now.

Speaking of hopeless, what the hell happened to the Astros!? As of today, they are 6-15.  This is a team picked by SI to win it all.  This was supposed to be the year.  With the high expectations from last year, they were supposed to improve on it and play up to their expectations.  Instead they have struggled out the gate and shat the bed.

What is weird is they have individuals playing lights out, but our pitching hasn't been there.  Altuve has been lights out.  Rasmus has been a monster.  Even Tyler White, their rookie starting first baseman was player of the week the first week of the season.  Our pitching, as it currently stands, looks like a pitching machine in a batting cage.  Opponents are currently abusing Astros pitchers with a .283 batting average.  Only the Brewers are worse with an opposing batting average of .293.  They're BABIP (Batting average of balls in play) is really high at ..326 which suggests quite a bit of bad luck.  That number should normalize and come down.

This is a team with the reigning Cy-Young (Keuchel), another pitcher who won 19 games (McHugh), and a team that literally traded the farm for a lights out closer (Giles).  Well first of all, Gregorson won the closer job, Giles has been crap.  McHugh looks bad and even Dallas seems off.

I realize that its still early and that baseball is a long long long season, so I'm trying not to be too fed up and upset.  But when you have a young team that before the season started had so much expectations fall on their face the first month and have nearly the worst record in baseball.  It's tough.  Alas, being an Astros fan has never been easy.

So to tie it all together, I feel like I have great expectations on me.  From my parents, work, friends. And I constantly feel like I am struggling to live up to them.  All I can do is trust in God that there is a plan for this crazy thing called life.