As you can probably tell, I’m feeling a little better at the plate lately. I’ve really been going out of my way to just focus on each at-bat as it comes and not think so much about the big picture.

I just realized the other day that when you’re playing, you don’t think about things so much. But when you sit around, it makes you think about things more. So what I was thinking about is that it’s May 11, and we play all the way until October. I’m one of those guys, where there have been plenty of times that I’ve made my whole season in two months. When I first got here in 2003, I didn’t even start playing every day until the second half of the season and look at what I did that year.

Even last year, I didn’t really start producing until June. I’m just taking things slowly and trying my best to make things happen. I just knew we would start playing better. Just take each day and try to win.

For the team, it’s the same thing. We had a slow start, but you can feel us starting to come around. People get depressed when they see a few games that don’t go how they expect, but we’ll be OK.

To be honest, I feel great right now. I feel the way I like to be right now. I started to feel a difference after the road trip. I started figuring a lot of things out and now you can see the difference. I’m just not playing every day right now, but if I start producing consistently like I can, I’m expecting the playing time will get back to normal.

One thing that has been a lot of fun for me lately is having my 5-year-old son, D’Angelo, at the park with me so much. That’s my life. That’s what I’m all about. Whenever I can have him with me, I take him with me. If he doesn’t have school, I’ll bring him over here to Fenway and teach him how to do the right things.

He loves being around here. He told me straightout, when I wasn’t even expecting it, “Daddy, I love hanging out with you.” That’s how they stay away from trouble. He just watches everything I do.

You see him out there at the batting cage just having a blast. He loves swinging. He will wear people out and just swing all day.