Baseball Talisman Week 3

The first quote was in a letter from the great poet, James Wright to his son Franz, who had completed a poem that he could finally send to his father.

"So, you're a poet. Welcome to Hell."


The second is from a letter I sent to E-Rod, one of my talented former students, who was having difficulty finding the time to write anything he was passionate about. I told him that if he didn't have to express something through writing, then he shouldn't have to worry about it. People live completely normal lives without writing, I told him. I told him to live a little. And then I warned:

"But if writing is survival to you-- If it is what keeps you out of trouble... If that creative impulse is what gives meaning and purpose to your life-- then for fuck sake, you'd better write, you little bastard."

Yes, profanity again, mixed with love and worry; my curse. As I spun and twirled this ball around for a week, I wanted to get rid of it. It felt like how I sometimes feel of myself-- beyond redemption.

Trinity and I played a long game of catch with the ball on a hot Saturday afternoon at Davidson Field -the old 1911 ball field half a block away, with those old-school covered bleachers. A stadium that will probably be bulldozed to make way for a much needed community pool. So much for historical preservation, so much for religious relics. We played catch, Trinity and I, on this endangered field, in an endangered moment of catch between father and son, with time against us as Trinity's baby teeth continue to give way to those gorgeously awkward adult chompers.

Trinity has still been afraid of the ball, still frozen in fear by the hard ball. My last baseballs have been of the spongier coach-pitch variety, which have done wonders for Trinity's courage. He has asked me every night to play catch with him in the fading light after an 11 hour work day. What a way to end it.

I almost left this #3 baseball at home on that Saturday, not wanting to corrupt one of the last sacred interchanges of my life, but out of stubborn duty to the commitment I have made, I included this ball too. And on this day, Trinity begged me to throw it as high as I could, and by God, he was catching them effortlessly, squealing with victory at first, then later, acting as if it were all just business as usual. And he was whipping the ball back to me, hard and on target.

Beside home plate was his bat, and his batting helmet, the one I spray painted gold, and added a metal facemask to, to protect that horsy smile. It was there just to be there, like a saddle and blanket to a spooked horse, getting used to the old equipment again.

The week before, we went to his old little league ball field to try our first batting practice since the time he was beaned twice in a row by an errant coach. He got the helmet on, stretched on his batting glove, got toward the batter's box, and proceeded to tell me that he couldn't do it, his head was too itchy...he wasn't ready. For once, I took the soft approach. I was the "baseball whisperer. " I patted him on the helmet, and drove him home.

But on this Saturday afternoon, he eventually asked, "So how about a little batting practice?"
I didn't get my hopes up. I watched him put on his gear, that same helmet, that glove, that bat, and he tentatively strode to the batter's box. He was in. I put on my best poker face, calm and steady. My inner voice whispered, "If you fuck this up, you have no right to be this boy's father." I grabbed a bucket full of soft core balls.

"O.K." I said. " Just stand in the box in your batting stance and watch the ball all the way. Don't worry about having to swing. Just get used to the ball coming to the plate." He nodded slightly.
"This is it" I thought, "Make sure you don't kill your son." I wound up, and threw it six feet outside. The second pitch was the same result. Trinity smirked that sarcastic smirk that I used to see on my father's face when he was a young pilot. "You're gonna have to do better than that, Dad," he chortled. I smiled, shook my head and stuffed another ball into my glove. He giggled a little more and got back into his stance.

I pitched a few good ones in a row, and he took swings at each of them, with growing confidence, timing and fluidity. I had one ball left in the bucket. The one with the quotes.

No shit.

I pitched--

he swung--

he pooped that damned ball right over my head.

What a shot!

Instead of looking where the ball went, I looked at him, jumping up and down, giggling like a dork. He was a frozen animal who had shed his icy skin, cold glass breaking all around him, a newly warm-blooded boy who trusted his father again.

You're damn right that's the way it happened, and I know that it pisses you off.

Sure, it's too perfect, and smacks of an overly-crafted revisionist's smarmy American ending. Well, it is what it is. And we were redeemed in that moment. If that's not artistic enough for you MFA types, then you can go piss off somewhere.