As I sit down with my laptop to write for NVTBL today, I'm watching the College Baseball Super Regional on TV. My Texas Longhorns have a three run lead, but the bad guys have bases loaded with one out.
So it follows that in addition to writing and watching, I am holding my breath and clinching my hands together and using all of my well honed jedi mind tricks to convince the baseball gods to extend my team's season by at least one more game.
I believe in the baseball world this is otherwise known as "DO NOT CHANGE YOUR SEAT. DO NOT GO TO THE RESTROOM. KEEP YOUR FEET, HANDS, TOES, FINGERS AND ALL OTHER BODY PARTS IN THE EXACT SAME POSITION OR ELSE YOU WILL RUIN THE MOJO AND THE BAD GUYS WILL WIN AND IT WILL BE ALL YOUR FAULT FOREVER MORE."
I will grant you that in the days when May turns to June and the end of the baseball season looms ominously and ever closer in the distance, it's possible that I take it a little far when it comes to my rituals, prayers and superstitions. And yet, I know that there are many fans in bleachers, in fold up chairs, and in stadium seats around the country who understand my specific brand of crazy.
Of course, we want to win because winning is indisputably more fun than is losing. But as I sit here feeling all of these familiar feelings of hope and uttering all of these oft-repeated pleas that maybe, just maybe this could not be the end for my team, I realize that in the last few weeks, this has been a universal feeling for parents at baseball diamonds all around the country. Whether it's Little League or NVTBL play offs or High School post-season play or the College World Series, countless moms and dads have held their collective breaths waiting and praying and hoping for their players to give them just one more day at the ballpark (or on the couch with the television tuned to the Longhorn Network, as the case may be.)
Because no matter if it's the parent of a "Little League-age-12 year old" or of a high school senior or even of a grown man playing in his last college game, for us parents, it's not as much about facing losing as it is about facing the possibility of that true, final inning.
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