Take Me Out to the Ballgame

Last night a handful of folks from my church assembled for a FW Cats baseball game. We had really great seats, and the weather was just perfect. We ate Kincaid's hamburgers and made lots of noise.

Being pseudo-poor, we rarely end up in decent seats, and last night we were surrounded by season tickets holders and die hard fans. It was hilarious! See, I like the Cats. We've been going to games for years, but we don't know all the players' stats and all that. We want to see them win, but it's not like when the Rangers play the Yankees. We go to these games to have fun.

So this septuagenarian behind us yells at the umpire after a questionable call, "Why don't you clean off the plate?" To which the woman in front of us responds, "What for? He's not looking at it anyway!" I cracked up right out loud.

It went like that most of the game. I even got into it, booing when the ump called a strike that was clearly high and outside. Well, it was if you could see the plate - if it weren't for the players scooting the dirt off the center of the plate with their shoes, it would have been buried by the end of the game.

There were these two really young bat boys. They couldn't have been more than 5 years old. I called them the itty bitty bat boys. The bats were nearly as long as they were tall. Let me tell you, these little guys were serious about the game. We were close enough to the dugout to see them as they stood patiently on the steps, never taking their eyes off the game so they could do their jobs. And they did their jobs extremely well. I didn't know there was such a thing as a 5 year old boy that could pay attention that long. It was cool to see the players and officials treating them respectfully, too.

I'm trying to teach the girls to like baseball as much as I do. The Not-So-Little One watches the plays. She asks lots of good questions. She's trying to learn. The Little One, however, spent the first two innings pouting that she didn't want to be there. I gently explained that we parents do lots and lots of things to entertain our children that we don't enjoy (can anyone say Chuck E Cheese's?) and that this time it was our turn to have fun. She found a cricket hanging on the wire above us to watch and settled down. She even asked a few questions about the game.

I teased her a bit by telling her that next year we are buying season's tickets so we can go to all of the games. I don't have words to describe the look she gave me as she sarcastically asked if the game was over yet.

We're actually hoping the Little One will play ball one day. She has a terrific arm (dunked the kindergarten teacher that was mean to her older sister at the school carnival not once, not twice, but three times in a row when she was seven) and can outrun every boy in her class. Loves to run the bases after the Cats games, blowing by the boys as she leaves them in her dust, waist-long hair flying in the wind. She's a vision, I tell you. Maybe it would be more appealing to her if she could wear tights and a ballet bun while she played.

There was a fireworks show after the game. The lady behind me said, "Oooh, I like those squiggly ones. They look like sperm." She said again a few seconds later, so I am sure that is what I heard. You get to see a different side of your church family when you go out in public with them. And I love that the most.