Shirl has reminded me that I didn’t blog about Opening Day. I ignored it entirely.
This is because I actually forgot that it was Opening Day!
For me, it is important to do so. I spent way too many OD’s with Dad (and associated Mom) at OD’s, dressed in perfect little suits at Mom’s behest, behind the glass in a box full of people way more interested in being in the owner’s box than in watching baseball.
You learn a deep lesson about life when you see a bunch of people in the best box in the stadium, clustered around — not the window giving onto the baseball field — but the television in the box, watching not the real game unfolding on the field before them, but the live feed piped in from the sportscasters’ booth.
So, every Opening Day, I celebrate by Not Being There.
I’d rather remember the first baseball game Dad took me to, at the old Crosley Field, which is now 2 stadiums ago for us here in Cincinnati.
No fancy box, though we did have tickets just above the dugout. The Reds played the Cardinals that night. We lost 4-0, but Dad showed me how to eat the peanuts from the shells (evidently, you’re supposed to get the shells all over the ground) and explained that a count of 2-2-2 usually means the batter’s going to strike out.
Now that’s baseball.
white pebble 