In fifth grade, I was a pathetic mess of a little leaguer. I signed up to play on a team, and on my very first practice, I went to cover second base on a steal attempt and got drilled in the face with a hard, fast throw from the catcher. Everything went hot orange with pain, and I could hear the footsteps and shouts of the other kids on the team running toward me from every angle of the infield.
“Whoah, are you okay?”
“Catch it with the glove next time.”
“You got hit! Oww!”
“The runner’s safe, right?”
Through the excruciating orange abyss, I could hear the adult voice of the coach saying, “Stay on your feet. Don’t fall down. Do not fall down.” Instantly, my knees gave way and I fell down. As a comic twist, my parents were furniture shopping while I was at practice, and they lost track of time and came to pick me up an hour late. Even the coach had left by that time, so there I sat alone on the curb by a crummy, dirt baseball diamond, gingerly cradling a black eye the size of Detroit.
At the doctor’s office, technicians discovered that I could barely see a thing from the eye that was bruised. Then they discovered I couldn’t see any better from the other eye. I was as near-sighted as a bat with cataracts, with the astoundingly awful 20/20 score of 20/480, which meant that I could see something from 20 feet as clearly as most people would see it from a tugboat off the coast of a foggy shore. On the next Monday of school, my fifth grade levels of embarrassment reached record-breaking heights when I stepped into the classroom. I not only had a monstrous swollen eye, but on top of it I wore a pair of horrible late-80s style tortoise shell glasses. I’ve never been quite sure what cool is, but that day, I was not it.
On a positive note, I could actually see for the first time in my life, but my confidence as a baseball player was destroyed. This all happened on the first practice of the season, so since most of the other kids didn’t know my name yet, they called me “the kid who got nailed in the face” for the entire time I was on the team. I was also petrified of the ball. When I went up to bat, I wouldn’t even swing. I’d just stand there like some kind of human version of a pitcher’s-skill-test, seeing if I would draw four balls or three strikes.
From this wretched goo of childhood misery, I grew into a man. I now have a wife and kids and a car and a house and a two-year-supply of extremely powerful disposal contact lenses, and I walk around town like any other confident member of adult human society. But somewhere locked inside me, that scared kid still nervously clutches the bat, praying for a walk. When my adult pals talk about their childhood sports memories, I usually try to change the subject to something safe like international embargos or Game of Thrones.
I’d certainly have no problem leaving that unpleasant memory in the dusty, forgotten box in the back of my psyche, where’s it’s lived for years with the night of my sophomore Winter Formal and the time I drank way too much at my cousin’s wedding and put my hand through the cake. But my son, Jack, is four years old, and he loves baseball more than anything else in the world. At six months old, I took him to Dodger Stadium and bought him a cap that he then wore every day for a year. As a toddler, he pitched, batted, bunted and threw pick-off throws with such untamed passion that passing strangers in the park would often stop with a laugh and watch him play for a few minutes. So, this spring, when he became eligible for Wee Ball, I knew I had to sign him up.
For the uninitiated, Wee Ball is the precursor of Tee Ball. That’s right. There’s now a level of little league before Tee Ball. It’s open only to four year olds, so you can probably imagine the hilarious absurdity that ensues with every play. When on defense, the kids chew on their gloves and pick grass, and when a ball is hit, all twelve or fourteen of them run and pile on top of it. Strangely, my son is probably the best player on any of the teams in the Wee Ball league. On every play, he’s dialed in and deathly serious. While most kids swat flies and ask their parents how much longer practice is, Jack approaches each play with an unbelievable degree of attention. When he bats from the tee, he breathes deep and steps into the batter’s box like the World Series is on the line. When he fields, he bounces on eager haunches, hoping that the ball is hit to him.
Of course since he’s four years old, all of this should be taken with a mountain of salt, but I can’t help but wondering, “What if he’s actually good?” Don’t my genes have to take over at some point? I’m afraid that he’ll want to give his whole life to baseball, only to find that half of his DNA came from a mash-faced fifth grader sitting on the curb in a parking lot. Won’t the other kids some day stop looking for earthworms in the outfield and start trying as hard as he does? What then? What will he do? Will he be all right?
I know these are my own fears from childhood coming into my life as a father, but to me, they feel real. At his Saturday morning practices, I sip coffee and calmly chat with the other parents, but inside, I’m that nervous little kid wincing from the hardball. After the last practice, Jack asked to sign up for the summer league, and I told him yes. He’s found something in life that he loves. As his dad, I know I’ll be fine.