It’s not news. He let us know it was coming well before the season began, allowing us to spend most of the year preparing for the reality. And when all that preparation proved insufficient, the five weeks since the Red Sox bowed out of the postseason have been spent trying to cope with an event that technically hadn’t even happened yet. But now it’s official: David Ortiz has retired.

There it is, sandwiched unceremoniously on the transaction wire between Cory Rasmus being sent to Triple-A and the immortal Mario Meza finding a home. Baseball’s version of the humbling reality that, when all is said and done, we will all die some day and go into the ground. A reminder of our own mortality and that everything must end and—

Alright, so the coping process is ongoing. We’ll all get there eventually.

So long, David Ortiz, and thank you for everything.