Larkyball...

It wasn’t that difficult to fall asleep under the influence of a couple pale ales, but it was difficult to wake up to reality the next morning—the dream was over, and evil beats good.
One afternoon during my high school years, probably a week after my dad’s, let’s say sixth or so angioplasty in a series of eleven, he told me not to worry about him, and that he wouldn’t die until he had seen me play in Dodger Stadium. Those words have haunted me since. At the time, I believed in it—I was a tremendous defensive centerfielder, but very average offensively. When I played Division III baseball in college, I was a good defensive right fielder, and an average hitter. Oh, and I had three knee surgeries to add to it, so the salad days of my baseball career had spoiled sometime in the middle of…genetics. Still, I kicked around the idea of at least trying out for an independent minor league baseball team just so I could say I had tried out for a professional baseball team, but that wasn’t ever a traveled avenue. My body knew better, my ability kind of knew, but my heart wasn’t always convinced. So the emotional half of my brain told me to be a teacher, and I put on fifteen pounds, and the above clichés, and I let reality flourish.
My dad will be turning 69 in a few weeks—the days are starting to mount. His memory acts as the tide, but his love for me is as steady as the hands of backup catcher. Bromden’s fog rolls into my head like a marine layer, and becomes the line between the dream and reality. It’s nice, though, to be covered in fog sometimes. No one really sees you—the anonymity is satisfactory. The escape into the dream world is, well, an escape. But secretly I wanted out of the fog, but I wasn’t willing to tell anyone. I’m baseball, I’m superstitious. I didn’t want to be the one responsible for the jinx—for myself, I could care less; for what’s greater than me is for what I desired. My players, they deserved it. My dad, he deserved it. My mom, too, she deserved it, because somewhere in the fog is the echo of her voice.
So when we were toward the later-middle of our twenty-game win streak this season, I dove into the fog to grab a piece of my teenage years, that kind of peace a son covertly craves: the fulfillment of a father’s wishes. I took a bite from the apple and saw what God had in mind—my high school baseball team was going to the finals this year, in Dodger Stadium. I knew it when we swept Thousand Oaks, handily, in a double-header. I knew it when we won the OC Nissan tournament, handily. I knew it when we swept our emotional and geographical rivals, Peninsula, handily. I even knew it when we were swept by our legitimate rivals, West Torrance. Those two games were intense, and full of baseball lessons for our players—smart players who would move on quickly from the disappointment of finishing second in league. I knew it when he handily beat our first round opponent, Dos Pueblos. I knew it when we came from behind on the road to beat Trabuco Hills. I knew it when Marc Venning hit a walk-off homerun in the bottom of the 8th to beat Upland to take us to the semis, the same player who lost his sister in a car accident last summer. I knew it was destiny. And then I knew we were going to beat the evil Redlands East Valley squad in the semis, simply because we could play better baseball than them, even though they had superior athletes. They were a bunch of goons, who loved popping off more than they loved playing baseball, there’s no way the baseball gods would let us lose to them.

Take a bite of the apple, and taste nothing of fruition.

Four runs in the top of the first ruined our offensive plan. Our offense isn’t built to overcome 4-run leads—not against a team like Redlands. But then we score one in the fifth (we should have had more if not for some shoddy baserunning), two in the sixth, and I know we have them if we keep it at 4-3 going to the bottom of the 7th, with our best hitter leading off, and our best bunter behind him. Fuj the magician calls for the intentional walk to load the bases with one out to set up the double play. The next hitter grounds to our shortstop, who throws to our second baseman for the force, who throws…high to our first baseman. The run scores, they tack on two more, we don’t breathe of the game in the bottom of the 7th, season over.

There are tears in my nephew’s eyes after the game—tears that let me know (I think), that he will work hard enough that he’ll be able to play high school ball. I know that’s what he desires…

There are tears in our players eyes. Our players who had to deal with losing a sister in a car accident, losing a dad in a bizarre golf-cart accident over a year ago, losing a classmate and fellow athlete to a car accident in March, and losing a dad to cancer last Christmas Day. They are a team who bonded together, and impostered their way through a great season at times, until they couldn’t be called imposters.

There are tears in the eyes of the father who at times, most likely snaked his way through our diamond grass. He says he’s sorry the year is over—I consider it a confession of all is sins, and he is absolved. Yet at this point, I am wary of the apple.

There are tears in my eyes. I can hardly look at my dad after the game. He probably does not know why. He probably does not remember that comment that haunts me. But selfishly, it’s all I think about it. Unselfishly, I think of my players. Unselfishly, I think of how close we were, but how great it was just to be part of the program. Unselfishly, I think of how much the kids accomplished, when I didn’t even think we would make the playoffs after an unsettling first six or so games. Selfishly, I sit in my classroom, alone, and cry. Selfishly, I wake up in tears, and let them pour out as the water hits my head in the morning shower. Selfishly, I am crushed.

I try to make sense of it all, and the reality of me makes it easier. The reality is there is something bigger in control, that would let evil win over good sometimes, because honestly, they were a bunch of assholes, and they didn’t deserve it. But such is reality. We were one game away from the Stadium, Chavez Ravine—which I list as my second home.

I swear I saw my dad’s eyes light up a week ago when I told him of our dream, but again, covertly, so he wouldn’t remember. But I saw the light, I thought. And I knew we were going. I pictured the picture of me coaching third base, which I would have with me forever. I pictured the picture of me with my parents, with the stadium grass and dirt in the background, the picture of fulfillment. Honestly, I don’t know if it would have mattered if we would have won or lost, selfishly. Unselfishly, winning and losing is all I care about. Upon that in our realm lies our judgment. It’s how we save our jobs, and continue doing what we love, what we are supposed to do.

There’s always something bigger out there, pulling the strings. Whether it’s a bet over Job, or the impulse to not drive one away, but rather to keep one still, I know it’s out there. It’s only when we try to interpret this, we get tangled in the strings, suffocating in the fog.

Unselfishly, it was a fantastic ride. Selfishly, I cry myself to sleep over the loss (hopefully temporarily) of a dream.