When my dad left back in ‘76 or so, around the time of the great American Bicentennial (DOUBLE THE PLEASURE DOUBLE THE FUN, MY FRIENDS), I went out in search of new paternal inspiration, still being highly imprintable (sic), and the new parent I found a couple years later beat me up ten times as bad as the original, and that old man's name was baseball.
But baseball got right to the point, not fucking around with a tearful Christmas here and there, a sober moment at a birthday gathering, a tousling of the hair during some lesson about how to tie your shoes. Baseball knocked me flat on my ass right from the get-go, sparing the pretensions.
The very first time Coach threw a ball at me, I wound up with a bloody lip. The very first at-bat resulted in what’s known as a 'brushing off of the plate,' quite a remarkable pitch for someone who was 6-years-old. The next pitch smacked me square in the helmet. ‘Head hunting’ they called it, and still they do.
I got up, woozy and crying, though I wasn't unhappy. The hit was like an awakening, and I hate to admit my deviant tendencies but what the hell, I once spent an entire day talking about teabags, but I LIKED it.
Baseball isn’t the father who taught me pain, but he’s sure as hell the one who taught me to ENJOY it.
And when I stood up to complete my at-bat the umpire told me I got to go to first base, and it was like that sugar pill in the mouse maze (I have come to find since then that life has so many sugar pills and that there are so many mouse mazes and some pain is so delectable and precious that you would do well not to regret the valleys in my presence, unless you’re looking for a Lincoln-Douglas SMACKDOWN).
In short, I was smitten.
And by ’86 or so, around the time of the great Texas Sesquicentennial (A PARTY AND A HALF, MY FRIENDS), I became the guy who always got hit. I would watch kids ducking out of the way of the high and tight fastballs and I would think, WHY?
I never jumped out of the way in 13 years worth of ball.
Although records like this weren't kept, I'm pretty sure I was hit more during my junior year of high school than anyone in the history of the Southeast Missouri Bootheel. I'm pretty sure that's why I was named captain of the team. I’m pretty sure that’s why I didn’t quit the team when I got by at home on a series of Texas leaguers and sacrifice flies.
I quit two games into my senior year, instead, after a summer where I turned my traveling team coach into a genius, where I made the paper every week with another game-breaking RBI, another multi-hit game another streak unbroken.
And not a single HBP.
* * *
The other day I brought my gear out for a picnic and Tristan picked up a glove and started playing catch with someone or another and I noticed he couldn't really catch the ball all that well. And I thought, well that's the double-edged sword of custodial fatherhood. It really gets in the way of a young boy's game. I mean, what the hell does he have to prove? I love the ever-living Christ out of him.
So I took him out to the diamond near our house and with a REAL ball and a REAL mitt and REAL determination, and I put a little pepper on that first toss, and it smacked him square in the face.
I still feel awful about this but I laughed when it happened, and he screamed 'DON'T LAUGH AT ME!' and then my heart sank, and goddamn my central nervous system but I kept laughing, INVOLUNTARILY, MIND YOU, even as I tried to give him comfort and encouragement, all of which was negated by my MAD INCESSANT SADISTIC LAUGHTER.
But I LIKE TO BE HIT, I wanted to say, realizing how sick this sounds. It's flat out bizarre is what it is.
Secret: It's not just baseball. No woman has ever slugged me in the shoulder and not had me fall head over heels in love with her, even if momentarily. If you want to win my heart, all you have to do is get about a three or four foot running start and put your entire weight behind your tiny fist and plow it into my arm and you will see the cartoon hearts coming out of my head. I bet I’m not alone. You should try it with that guy you're interested in. Next time you see him, don't say 'hi' and curl a lock of hair around your finger coyly. Get right to the goddamn point. Just flat out deck him.
Nine times out of ten, you’re golden. EVERY now and then the person will press charges, but that's a good analogy.
Sometimes love, no matter how well intentioned, is little more than a Class C Misdemeanor.
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