Spring in our step; summer in our slide
So I’m loading the softball gear, three trips from the garage to the car, with nylon bags bulging with I-don’t-know-what. The 9th Infantry Division travels lighter than the average youth sports coach. But then, the stakes are far higher.
“Don’t you ever get tired of all that?” my wife asks from the doorway.
Did Picasso ever get tired of paint? Did Magellan ever get tired of sea breeze? Does vodka ever get tired of tonic?
“What’s to get tired of?” I ask.
“Schlepping that junk all over town,” she explains.
“Never,” I say.
“Never?” she asks skeptically, as only a wife can.
At which point two dozen softballs spill out of the car and roll back toward the garage. At which point my wife tries to stifle a laugh but can’t. At which point I curse a little, which makes my wife laugh even louder.
They don’t call them the opposite sex for nothing.
“Thanks for the help,” I say.
“Anytime,” she says.
Welcome to another season of high-stakes girls softball, brought to you, mostly, by a bunch of fathers in last year’s jeans, sacrificing unsteady marriages and shaky careers for a chance at another pennant. At least I think that’s why we’re doing it.
“Why are there so many cars?” the little girl asks as we glide down the busy boulevard 10 minutes later.
“Baseball practice,” I explain.
There are indeed a lot of people out early on this March Saturday, fueled by Thin Mints and the nagging sense that they might be missing something, or that some great and spontaneous event is about to occur. Spring, maybe.
“Jeesh, look at those gas prices,” I snarl.
“Jeesh,” says the little girl.
I explain to her that you can’t go very wrong in this country selling liquids. Gasoline. Coffee. Bottled water. Beer. As a nation, we are hooked on liquids. In fact, it is perhaps the Golden Age of fluids. Starbucks. Unocal. Budweiser. One day they will all merge and be bigger than Michael Eisner’s ego.
“It’s something to remember,” I tell her.
“Thanks, Dad.”
“I miss the Earth so much, I miss my wife ... ,” Elton John sings on the radio.
At the softball field, we unload the gear, then spread it out like a bad picnic near the first-base dugout. The sun warms the east side of our faces. Clover opens between our shoes. One by one, SUVs pull up and drop off our players.
In my mind, girls leagues are the most significant sports development of the last 50 years, the fact that they can get out here like their brothers to catch ground balls in the chin and scrape their tender elbows. I’m not saying it’s a good development. Just a significant one that bears mentioning.
“Let’s practice sliding,” I suggest.
“Ooooh,” the girls groan.
“Come on, girls, let’s go,” says Coach Steve.
We set out an old piece of cardboard for the girls to practice sliding on. I found it in the Dumpster by the church last week while walking the dog. Perfect.
“OK, take your shoes off,” says Coach Dave. “It’s easier to learn in your socks.”
So they line up and practice sliding on the dusty cardboard, 10 girls who rarely step off the Berber carpeting of their suburban bedrooms. Most of their young lives, they have been scolded not to get their clothes dirty or not to run with scissors. Now we are teaching them to slide furiously into second base, with knees that have never known blood. Progress comes slowly.
“Throw your hands up,” Coach Dave tells them.
“Never let go of the base,” urges Coach Steve. “Never.”
I give the girls directions that come out sounding vaguely like Irish toasts -- short, philosophical bursts of advice that they can carry with them forever. Irish toasts are big on longevity and children, two great themes. Longevity being important in the sense of not being blindsided by a bus or shot dead by your wife. Children being important in the sense of ... well, I forget exactly.
“Close your hands when you slide,” I tell them.
“Why?” Alexis asks.
“You won’t jam your fingers,” I say. “And your wedding rings will fit better.”
The girls respond positively. They are in favor of any techniques that will prevent them in any way from ever resembling their coaches. The coaches’ knees are scarred and zippered with old stitches. Our fingers gnarled from catching fly balls the wrong way 30 years ago. Maybe 40.
“How’s that, Coach?” one of the girls asks after a knees-first slide that looks like something Tony Orlando used to do during his finales.
“That’s perfect,” I lie.
Obviously, there is much work to be done. But here’s an Irish toast to early March, when the days are warm and the shamrocks are flourishing: “May there be a generation of children, on the children of your children.”
And may every one of them play a little ball.
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Chris Erskine can be reached at chris.erskine@latimes.com.
