DC: What is your fondest family memory growing up and why?
Cliff: I will simply answer “baseball.” I know, I know. “That’s not very substantive.” Well, it may not appear to be a substantive, serious response, but it would be hard to overstate the role that baseball played in my developing years. At a very non-romantic level, baseball was simply a fact of life: All three of my older brothers were big into baseball. So, the vast majority of afternoons and evenings of every summer from the beginning of memory, was centered around baseball. We lived across the street from our town’s ballpark. My dad coached a number of our teams, and he served on the very involved town board that orchestrated the fund-raisers and the installation for the baseball field’s first night-lights. Besides a brief foray into the lesser sports, (track and basketball in middle school, and golf in my early adulthood) baseball was the only sport I truly played, up until I retired the glove just last year.
But, at a deeper level, baseball was a very substantial part of my identity for those first 18 years or so. Anyone with older siblings understands how this works. My three older brothers were excellent baseball players. They all played from the time they were in 1st grade, up through high school. And, dang it! I was going to do that, too, and I was going to be better than them! So, before I was even old enough to play organized Pee Wee League (a.k.a. tee-ball), I was spending all my Summer free time at the park. I watched. I role-played. I learned. I mimicked. Countless times, I pretended to be (a right-handed, white) Joe Morgan… with the elbow flick… bottom of the ninth, two outs, runners on, down by two. The pitch… and the swing… *gasp* A homerun every blasted time. We regularly played pick-up games with the other kids in the neighborhood. My mom would have to call us in at night, and I would be covered from head to toe with sweat and dust from the baseball field. I remember the shower water running black. Summer was baseball, and winter was simply the colder season.
As it turns out, baseball wasn’t just for fun. Baseball also taught me a number of lessons. Many of these lessons are quite symbolic, and are easily translatable into life-lessons. I still benefit from them. Here is a sampling such lessons:
- There is no substitute for intentional, repetitive – and often boring – practice.
- Always be prepared to act in case the ball is hit to you.
- You can’t hit a homerun every at bat.
- Most games are won on simple base hits.
- You CAN play in the rain.
- If you strike out four times in one game, you will NOT spontaneously combust.
- If you hit two doubles and a triple in one game, the girls will NOT jump the fence to shower you with kisses.
- Don’t be fooled by scrawny batters.
- Never listen to those on the opposing team.
- If you support your team, after being humiliated by the coach, you can earn his respect.
- Keep your eye on the ball, even when you’re not playing.
- You will never become a base-stealer if you never TRY!
- You will never become a pitcher if you never ASK!
- Patting your teammate on the back when he is having a tough time on the mound, will mean more than you could imagined.
- If you dive into a securely planted base, without bending your elbow, you might dislocate your shoulder.
COROLLARY #1: There is no comfortable position when you are being driven to the hospital with a dislocated shoulder.
COROLLARY #2: Valium ROCKS!! But, you remember more with Demerol.
So, as for “fondest family memory”, baseball might seem a little trite. But, as a family, we didn’t take a lot of vacations. I argued with my brothers a lot. Two of my brothers were old enough that I don’t have too many solid memories at all with them. But, one thing we always had, at every picnic, at every family reunion, after every supper, at every church event, over every Spring Break, through every summer, and into every cold-enough-to-freeze-your-earlobes Autumn: We had baseball.
Now, the new quest: How to get my daughter hooked?
No comments:
Post a Comment