Memories... Like the Corners of My Mind...

For the record, I have no clue what that song lyric means...

There are very few places that invoke memories for me like a baseball park... From sitting on bleachers at high school and minor league games in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and New York (those are worthy of another post in themselves)... to seats at major league stadiums in Philadelphia, San Diego, NYC, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, Anaheim, Houston, and Cincinnati... from the many games at both Orioles Park at Camden Yards and RFK Stadium... and now at Nationals Park... It never fails to bring a tear to my eye on Opening Day when I hear the ticket takers and ushers say "Welcome Home"... If I ever have a beach house, it shall bear that name...

I remember having a transistor radio when I was very young - I think it was a Christmas present - that pulled in stations from what seemed like all over the world... In reality I think it only picked up as far as the midwest (perhaps the prairie) on the AM dial, but that was still a world away from small town PA... There was nothing like listening to a Cardinals game played very quietly in the middle of the night when I was supposed to be sleeping...

The first World Series of which I have vivid memories was the Phillies- Royals series in 1980... Grandma and I spent hours listening to those playoff and championship games on the radio with Aunt Ada and Dad... I was mesmerized at the time and still would rather listen on the radio than watch on tv... Thank you XM radio for indulging me... Now SIRIUS, can you find a way that I can have those same games on my car radio?

In the mid-90s, it was still less than an hour's drive from downtown DC to Baltimore and we made that drive after work many times... sometimes arriving early enough to watch the sprinklers making rainbowed arcs across the perfect green turf in the outfield and hear the repetitive crack upon crack of the bat meeting balls during batting practice on the infield... There are very few bad seats at Camden... In fact, Beth and I may have only sat in them once - just at the corner sections where the foul poles are perched... Even those weren't bad enough to ruin a game... And if it's one of those 90+ degree humidity-filled nights in July, find a seat as high up as you can and the breeze off the harbor will actually feel chilly...

Perhaps one of the best memories I have of Camden Yards is of a playoff game - a day game - where I allowed my love of the game to override my otherwise normal workaholic tendencies. Chris and I skipped work on the pretense of taking our mothers' to doctors' appointments but instead hopped in his car and zipped up to Baltimore on a clear blue sky day in early fall... A day we were sure was leading us straight to the World Series (if not also to Hell for skipping work)... The traffic might have been an omen when we were delayed due to lack of parking and didn't make the stadium until the third inning... The Orioles never made the Series either that year...

But the Nationals gave me a place to call my own - yet another "home"... There is nothing like having your own ballpark less than 20 minutes away... When Mayor Williams announced DC had gotten a baseball team in 2005, I was on the phone less than 10 minutes later putting down a deposit on season tickets... They arrived on my birthday... and we spent a glorious summer at RFK... Sure it was old and decrepit... a bit of a dump even... but it was OUR dump...

I was blessed on that first Opening Day to be working downtown... I still allowed 2 hours to get to RFK... As luck would have it, I got lost in Southeast DC... (quelle surprise...) Thank goodness I had the presence of mind to follow what appeared to be a DCPD bus onto an on-ramp going towards the stadium... Somehow we routed around the lines of cars wending their way into the parking lots... When we hit the bottom of the ramp, it was a misery of trying to merge into the gridlock, but merge we had to...

Then everything stopped as another car that had been weaving through barely clearing cars on either side came to a grinding halt... against and IN FRONT OF my bus buddy... The police came up to me and directed me around the incident... When I got past there were more cars but I was 12 cars ahead of where I had started... Suddenly another policeman appears and tells me to pull up and over to the right - AHEAD of even MORE cars... Who was I to argue?? The air filled with the sound of motorcycles and sirens (and maybe some honking horns)... I turned my head to see the team bus followed by 4 black SUVs surrounded by police escort... Close enough for me to touch, it turned out to be the team (obviously) and the Presidential motorcade... Once they passed, I was on my way... and 5 minutes later pulled into the parking lot - one of the first 10 cars arriving for the auspicious day... When I called Jack to tell him where I was, he was still 90 minutes away and the shock of how easy it had been was palpable in his response of "Are you kidding?!?!?"

I will never know if having a license plate reading "X OS FAN" contributed to the helpfulness of the police officers or if it was just my guardian angels yet again looking out for me, but it was the start of a glorious season...

I get chills at the memory of that Opening Day - and not only because we were in gloves and parkas... Watching the elder statesmen Washington Senators take the field to hand off the legacy of the past to the players of the present as baseballs were passed hand to hand at their positions... The flyover by the Blue Angels that scared the hell out of me... That lone positive comment I made about our former president Bush when he threw a great pitch to open the game... (I think I would have preferred him as baseball commissioner and in some ways I think he would have preferred it too...) The brilliance of thousands of flashbulbs as Livan threw the first pitch of what would be the most unexpectedly successful half season I have ever witnessed... If you get the chance to visit the Presidents Club, you can see a panoramic view of that moment caputured... and you can see me and Jack on the far right of the picture about midway up... I am wearing a black turtleneck and blue ballcap... You know... my uniform...

There will never be enough ways to say "thank you" to each of the people who are a part of my baseball memories - even if I did know all the names... Know that you are thanked - publically and personally, silently and out loud - and special to me each time I am reminded of why I love baseball and especially during each moment of my upcoming trip to the Dominican Republic.