I know I am aging. There are many obvious indicators of my advancing years, some with accompanying pain for me… as well as for those of you who must look at me. And I see, as one of those gauges of my progressing age, my constant grumpiness with things over which I really have no control, yet poke into my psyche, as must a burr under the saddle of a pack animal.
One which particularly comes to mind are these team sports for children in which score is no longer kept. The idea being that it is more important to be playing the game than to care about who wins and who loses. Proponents of this ideal insist it helps enhance the self-esteem of the children to just be playing and not having to suffer the humiliation or, at least, sadness at having lost the game.
What these well-meaning folks do not realize is that, by depriving the kids of winning and losing, they are preventing the opportunity to learn some life-lessons.
When these kids grow up and find that there are, indeed, winners and losers in life, they are going to have to learn to deal with it then , instead of having learned at a much earlier age.
The Passion of my Youth
Return with me, for a moment, to the passion of my youth. Baseball. Little League Baseball was the only thing I cared about. On days when I had an after-school game, I could barely concentrate in class. I played Little League for three of my grade school years.
To this day, the smell of a leather baseball mitt hurls me right back to the dugout where anxious, over-stimulated boys, barely able to keep their seat along the bench as the team father/manager ran down the batting order; each of us waiting impatiently for him to reach us and hold out his cap so we could grab our piece of Bazooka Joe Bubble Gum. And to this day, as I recall stepping into the batter’s box, my heart rate increases.
It must have been when I was in fifth grade. That makes me, what, 11-years-old? My friend and classmate, David Z, played on an opposing team. That afternoon our teams would be playing against each other. I don’t recall what prompted it, but we stepped up the ante by betting a nickel on the game.
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The details of the game escape me, but the pitcher’s duel that it was, had us knotted at 16 runs each in the bottom of the last inning. David’s team was the home team that day and in that last inning, they had loaded the bases and brought the score to even. There were two outs. I was playing first base. When they tied the score, my heart sank, but I quickly thought, “OK, let’s get this last guy out and, with a tie score, at least I won’t lose…”
For some reason, I looked to the second baseman. He was one of two kids on the team who were sons of the manager. He was in his first year in little league and I can still picture him, playing the next position over. There was a cartoon character on TV when I was a kid. I wish I could remember his name or on what show he appeared. He was a long-eared puppy, who was always happy and excited. Gleefully he would bound though the cartoon, oblivious to the destruction he caused by his inability to control his gangly limbs.
This was the perfect picture of the kid at second base.
I called over to him, knowing my only shot at getting out of losing this bet was to make sure this kid knew to throw the ball to me. I figured the odds were 50/50 that he’d field a ground ball, but, if he did, and could throw it the short distance to me, we’d get the final out, the runner at third would not score and I’d be saved the humiliation of losing that nickel to my friend. “If the ball comes to you, throw it to me!!!” I practically pleaded with him.
And he rapidly nodded his head just like that cartoon puppy. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh-huh! Yeah, Yeah!!!” And though I knew he’d heard me, I still felt dread at the myriad other possibilities that could lead to my mortification.
Well, I can happily tell you that the batter hit a rolling ground ball right to him. And he scooped it up! I sidestepped to the bag and extended my mitt. Whew! I escaped a close call. A short, easy toss to me and the game would be over. I wouldn’t win, but I wouldn’t lose.
Like it happened yesterday I can still see the flailing of his arms and legs in a whirling cyclone of energy. They moved so quickly and furiously that I could swear to you that he had sprouted another leg and three more arms.
The slow motion, low-toned “Nooooooooo!” which escaped my lips was later to become a movie cliché. From that cloud of dust the young tornado had instantly created, I saw the ball begin its voyage towards home plate. If I had used the F-word in fifth grade, that single word would have summed up my entire feeling.
Each instant took an eternity. I saw, in great detail, the runner at third close his eyes as he broke towards home. The batter tossed his bat aside and I could hear the hollow clunk as each end bounced on the infield dirt and the chop-chop-chop of his steps as he headed towards me was like my morning cereal crunching in my ears. Our catcher stood and moved to cover the plate, his glove extended towards the incoming baseball.
My eyes grew to wide saucers as I urged the ball into the catcher glove. The red seams on the dirty ball rolled over and over and my breathing stopped. Yes! I will not lose this bet to my friend! Thank you, God, thank you!
The End of My Life
Then the arc of the ball took a sudden dive. And, instead of hitting the catcher in the mitt, it passed between his outstretched arms and landed squarely on his shin-guard, the resounding echo of the ball on metal tolling my requiem bell as the baseball rolled back into the infield.
People in the stands stood, arms stretched overhead. Gloves from the opposition were hurled into the air. The roar, I’m sure was deafening, but I heard nothing. I barely felt the pain in my knees as they met with the hard infield dirt where I slumped there in defeat.
How will my life ever be the same? How will I face David? I will never hear the end of this! What will my father say if he hears that I called our second baseman every dirty word I knew? What is the penalty for actually killing a stupid stinky poo-poo head in this state? And would there be leniency once I explained to the judge and jury the extreme transgression committed by this third-grader who, had he not been the son of the manager, clearly should have been relegated to right field?!
Not much remains with me from the rest of the evening, but it the morning I can still see my parents, both standing over my bed, as I, tears running down my cheeks, emphatically explaining that I was way too sick to go to school. My Father told my Mother that I was just faking it because I’d lost a nickel to a friend on the game. And he was right. But the depth of my performance, heights of my shrieks and real live tears convinced them to let me stay home.
The rest of that day dragged on as I lay in my bed, seconds passing like hours. It wasn’t long after they left my room that it dawned on my little brain that I’d only delayed the inevitable. And now I had the whole rest of that day, stuck in bed due to my fakery, to lie there and suffer in advance all of the humiliations I’d hear the next day.
Comes the Dawn
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As I was chaining my bike to the stand in front of school the next morning, sure enough, David came running up, his white teeth gleaming a huge smile. “HA! We won! You chickened out yesterday! Where’s my nickel?!” I reached into my pocket and handed it over.
“Come on,” he said, and turned toward the playground, explaining some recent development which had recently occurred thereon.
I hesitated for a moment, standing there blinking. That’s it? It’s over?! That was all there is to it??!!
And it was all there was to it. Though I couldn’t articulate it at the time, my thoughts were basically that I’d anticipated that morning’s encounter with David would be the end of the world. Yet the Sun still rose in the East. I even realized that I’d caused myself infinitely more suffering by delaying the inevitable for a day, than David had inflicted upon me.
Again, these were vague ideas, but the message I learned was clear. First, I caused more suffering delaying and agonizing over what might happen than I felt from what actually happened. Second, and one of the most important lessons in my life: You can lose at a game (or something else) and the sun still rises the next morning.
To me, that is a much better lesson to have learned at an early age than what, if any, self esteem I may have gotten from a game in which no life lessons were offered.
