Post Season

Those that know me well, know that I live for one thing come late March: Baseball

I am a hardcore baseball fanatic. I truly love the game.  I started a goal a couple of years ago to visit every MLB park.  So far, I've done 3. By the time the year is done, I will be checking off two more. My favorite team: New York Yankees. I saw that eye roll. Have we been losing? Yes. Does our pitching need a re-haul and reboot? Also Yes. But no matter how much they lose, I keep coming back.

On Wednesday I leave for a short trip to NYC, to go to the last home game between the Yankees and the Red Sox.  I will be traveling with my father.  "A Field of Dreams" type baseball pilgrimage trip. No children, no other folk; just us two. It is the first time ever in my adult life that I travel with him.  Needless to say, the trip means a lot to me.

My parents and I have never had a close relationship and of course you can argue that many people have this situation with their parents.  But you see, our relationship is strained. Very strained.  Just this week alone, I've had a million reasons to cancel this trip.  But I won't. I need to see the Yankees. I need this trip with my father; which was his idea in the first place.

He was never the doting dad.  Never will be.  Still, in my late thirties (very late), I struggle with this fact.  We hardly exchange words, much less embraces or affection.  We have little to nothing in common. But come March, something magical happens: Spring Training.

My father is a baseball fan. I am a baseball fan, because of my father.

March rolls around and it is like we are two different people.  We talk daily. We watch plays.  We watch games. We talk stats: ERA's and WHIP'S and magic clinch numbers.  We celebrate when the Yankees win and curse like sailors when they don't.  As a child, our living room was decorated with pennants and pictures of Gooden and Strawberry (he was initially a Mets fan).  He was happy and relaxed watching baseball.  I would join him in the living room.  We would go to the park on Sunday and play catch. He took me to the old, ORIGINAL, Yankee stadium. I sat next to him and I can still smell the hot dogs and feel in my hands the little tiny wooden bat he bought me, emblazoned with the Yankee top hat logo.  Baseball gives us a relationship; gives me a piece of normalcy, that I cannot have the rest of the year. I am beyond elated we play a long season; 162 opportunities for conversations. His coldness melted away by a triple play or a no-hitter.

Then in late October or early November, we settle back into our silence.  Each drifted apart into the cold, long winter off season. This past week we've acted like the off season was already here; bickering and distancing ourselves. On some days not even baring to be in the same room together. But this afternoon, he asked if I had packed and showed me the new Yankee shirt he plans to wear to the game.  We even talked about going to the Friday game vs Baltimore. But we never, EVER, speak of the things that happen between us; the things that haunt us and makes us as dysfunctional as we are. We will never speak of those things. We are only fluent in one language: baseball

The Yankees lost again (another blown save by Betances) and I should be used to it by now.  I really should. But it is the final stretch before post season and I detest being eliminated. My Boston friends tell me it's not too late to jump ship and join the dark side. They shower me with inquiries as to "Why do you keep rooting for a team that keeps losing?" Part of me wants to answer that it is because it is the only thing I know.  Part of me wants to answer that I will love them, no matter what. That they suck at times, that they disappoint me at others. That they make plays that baffle me and leave me bewildered.  But deep down, it is glorious to see that triple play, that win, that home run in the bottom of the 9th when we are down by a run.  That elation of a walk off, that fills you with utmost joy and you can only see if you are a true fan that doesn't quit.  Cause Berra said it best: "it ain't over, 'till it's over"