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Excerpted from Central PA magazine, OCTOBER
2001
It is
high noon on the Sunday after Labor Day. Through the open car door I
can hear the dry crunch of parking-lot gravel as adults and children
carry picnic jugs and gloves toward a distinctively American kind of
park. My husband, Frank, can't wait to begin the first baseball game
of his first-ever season in an adult league. I do not want to tell
you the name of the league.
But I
will. Oldtimers Baseball.
"Gonna
swing for the fence?" our 17-year old son asks. "No, Dan, I just
want to hit the ball." The car window frames the name on Frank's
jersey: Yankees. I am out of the car just in time to see Frank's
dimpled grin. I have an armload of paraphernalia: camera, water
thermos, newspaper and an impulse purchase: plastic
pompoms.
Several
other wives have already set up camp on the bleachers. Children run
in all directions to check out the playground, the concession stand,
the bathrooms. We watch the players warm up, and I wonder if this
game is important to the others for the same reason it is important
to Frank: Baseball was the career path not chosen, the participation
sport postponed.
While
we wait for our game to begin, Dan and I hear the familiar voices of
Amy and Dave Oblender. Dave's father also has come to watch. Amy
says, "Dave's dad played baseball."
He
looks pleased. "We had the old-style gloves, you know, the fingers
weren't webbed together. Ball was bigger, too. Softer. Not softball,
though. Yep, still a hardball."
"Can
you believe you're still watching your son play?"
Mr.
Oblender snorts his laugh. "It's not Little League anymore, is it?"
Later, he says, "I can think of worse ways to spend my time.
Baseball's a good game."
Yes, it
must be a good game, because today fathers and mothers will
watch their sons play baseball, and sons and daughters will also
watch their fathers play.
The
Yankees trot into the outfield. Frank takes first base. I like this
team immediately. Lots of variety. All sizes, backgrounds, ages.
Rookies, all but three. Players must be at least 38. There is no
upper age limit. I say something to coach and sometime pitcher Steve
Hoke about changing the league name. How about The Young-at-Hearts?
Or the Baby Boomers.
He
laughs, shakes his head and says he'll take my suggestions to the 13
other coaches. Hoke is one of the league's founders and has missed
only one game in its 10-year history. Frank tells me that when the
word went out about Oldtimers Baseball, 177 men signed up to
play.
As it
turns out, the Oldtimers know how to move a game along. Their
offensive game warms up by inning three or four, but their defense
stays strong throughout, as if they had been playing together for
several seasons. Frank stretches to reach the ball and the runner
and make the outs. Gladfelter and Oblender do look for the fence,
and their hits jump right over. Palmer's pitching stance wears
grooves into the mound. The Yankees get their win. Every single
player appears to be having the time of his life.
We do
not spectate passively. We stand up, walk around, bite our nails,
talk to fellow spectators of both teams, take snapshots. And we
cheer. Yankees fans get into it. I visit the shop where I bought my
pompoms and buy a dozen more. Three more games will be played before
I realize baseball does not have cheerleaders. By then it's no
longer true.
Sunday
afternoons pass. The days shorten. So do the games, by one inning.
Summer breezes turn into northbound winds that whip around our
sweatshirts and turn our feet to stone.
One
October afternoon turns especially cold. The teenage girls who run
the concession stand admit sheepishly they are out of hot beverages.
Our team faces the Tigers, one of the league's most seasoned teams.
If we win, we will be tied for first place. It promises to be an
uphill battle because we are missing three players.
By the
fourth inning, it looks as if the Yankees may have to accept their
second loss of the season and take second place. We spectators are
cold enough to be philosophical about it. But Palmer battles his way
out of the rest of inning. The Yankees close the gap in the sixth.
Tie score: five-up. Now the Yankees fans are on their feet -- or the
stumps that once were their feet -- stomping for a tie and a fast
seventh inning, and for blood to circulate.
After a
scoreless seventh, Commissioner Ken Hersey calls for an eighth
inning to break the tie. The sun has set, and every shred of warmth
has vanished.
"Junior" Munoz leads off with a single for the Yankees. Hoke
flies to right. Palmer reaches first on a fielder's choice. Shaffer
reaches base on an error by the shortstop. Bases loaded. Two outs.
Dwayne Bahn steps to the plate. We are peering at the darkening
field, trying to see. I hear someone -- it's Frank, who's next at
bat -- tell Bahn to "get a base hit. That's all we need. Just a base
hit." We hear the bat and ball connect -- for the extra inning's
game-winning hit.
There
are more Sundays, and more games. The Yankees take another loss,
just one run shy of first place. But it's not a heart-breaker. It's
a game. The Palmers put out an invitation to a "we-almost-won"
party. As the end nears, the team realizes it will never play
together after this season. Recreation-league rules see to
that.
"How
old do they think they are?" one of us asks as we squint into the
autumn half-light.
"Can't
you tell? They think they're major leaguers. This feels like the
real thing to them."
Someone
else says, "Yes, it's the real thing, all right. And they are 13
again -- 14, tops."
Even
through the chain-link backstop, we can see she's right. Across the
field our husbands have formed a line and are high-fiving the other
team. By some magic they have become gawky, grinning teenagers
again. Gum wadded in their cheeks. Before girlfriends or families or
mortgages. Their arms and legs feel young again. They are full of
their accomplishment, flush with the promise of a summer and a sport
that has no end, because the season lives on and on where it began.
In their hearts.
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©
2001 WITF Inc.
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