I am trying to write about the last few days, and it feels like a futile endeavor. I last wrote about the supernatural, the specters and demons of history that can haunt a team. Now, it only feels appropriate to talk about the future, about possibilities.

Francisco Lindor will be 37 years old in 2031, his final contract year with the New York Mets. I recently completed my 37th year of existence. Personally, it was mostly unremarkable. There was no major change in my life. I worked the same day job, lived in the same apartment, cooked my usual meals, and routinely hit the elliptical machine to ease an old back injury. Lindor is currently plaything through a back injury, and every sportswriter on the planet reached for the metaphor of him carrying the team on his back. It’s an apt metaphor. He has had an MVP-caliber season, punctuated yet again by the heroics you can watch above this paragraph. I watched it live on TV, and probably about 30 more times on various other screens.

I cannot say what will happen in the next round. I am not clairvoyant, no one really is. All I know is that the stench of failure from bygone seasons is no longer present. Mark Vientos has twice made an error in attempting to throw home for an out this postseason. In the days of yore those errors would have ended the October run. Now they are inconsequential. They are overcome. Anything feels possible.

If all this waxing on the Mets feels a bit ethereal and ungrounded, it is because the words escape me. As I was in a bar last night taking in the game, I kept experiencing an inner turmoil. Surely the Mets were going to allow the Phillies to cruise to a 1-0 victory. They kept stranding runners in scoring position, they loaded the bases twice and failed to capitalize. Those ghosts were back. How foolish of me to think otherwise!

The other side clamored for consideration. These Mets keep coming back from the brink. They are the poster children for late-inning heroics. Losing 1-0 to the Phillies? Forget it. Being down 1-0 was exactly what this Mets team needed to lock in. Lindor’s beautiful swing erased all that swirling pessimism. Edwin Diaz’s shakiness brought it right back.

In the end, optimism won the day, and the old routine lost. The words escape you when they are at war inside your heart. Words are resolute, emotions are tumultuous. Routines and patterns give us a sense of stability, even when the repetitious motions lead to heartbreak and despair. When the normalcy shatters, we don’t know what to do, what to say. This is again true for both tragedy and triumph. Someone coined the word awestruck. We also have the word dumbstruck. These are words we use to describe not having the necessary words.

Keep me awestruck and dumbstruck, Mets.