I am one of those people who takes sports very seriously. Perhaps, too seriously. But to be honest, I have zero shame about it.
It is well known among my friends that my general well-being and outlook on life in the fall is completely dictated by the Texas Longhorns football team. If at all humanly possible, I will not miss a minute of any of the games my kids play. Sports are on my tv all day, every day. If I don't have a dog in the fight, I will pick a team. Futhermore, I will choose a random player on said team to be my favorite and cheer and pray for him as if I birthed him from my own body. Give me all your high school basketball games, your National championship games, your 7 game series, your Sunday at Wimbledon, and your 18th hole at the Masters. I'll take them all. I might be a complete weirdo about it, but I will own my weirdo-ness. My name is Jenn and I love the sports.
Of all of those many contests though, there is perhaps no sporting event that has grabbed a tighter hold on my heart than the Little League World Series. Every August I am glued to ESPN watching teams from eight regions of the United States and eight countries around the world compete in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. It is, in my opinion, the best sporting event in the history of history.
Of course, it might be because my three boys each played Little League along with travel baseball every year. It could be because my husband was coaching Little League with his high school buddies when I met him and continued to coach our boys over the years. And it could be due to the truth of the words of James Earl Jones to Kevin Costner in the movie, Field of Dreams:
"The only constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it's part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good and could be again."
I mean:
This year there was a little something extra added in to make the LLWS better than ever. For the first time in 25 years the team from Virginia represented the Southeast region at the LLWS. Even better, that team was made up of 13 boys from my VERY OWN LITTLE LEAGUE, Loudoun South. Friends of mine had kids on the team. Little brothers of some of my boys' teammates were taking the field on national tv. News helicopters flew over our town's practice field and reporters showed up at our local restaurants' watch parties.
So basically for most of the summer our little community has been pretty much like this:
So it was that along with my son, Joe, who was not due back to college for a few days, I decided it was time to knock an item off the bucket list. We donned our Loudoun South gear, buckled into the car, and took the four hour drive to Williamsport to watch our very own boys play in the US semi-final game last week.
As we walked into the gates and saw the field from the top of the hill, I kept my cool and remained calm about the whole thing:
If that photo doesn't accurately convey my feelings, just know that on the inside I was pretty much like this:
The grass was perfectly green and spectacularly manicured. Big and little kids alike were sliding down the hill beyond centerfield on pieces of cardboard. The boys from Japan were taking on the boys from Korea in the International Semi-final on the field below.
Again, you can see that I was totally nonchalant about it:
My heart raced and my eyes filled. It was absolutely delightful. We walked around and ran into some of our Loudoun South peeps, including a friend who was one of the assistant coaches. I hugged him like he was my long lost brother and asked how he could possibly be walking around like a regular guy even though he was now clearly a very famous and legendary baseball coach. Where in the world was his bodyguard?
We hit the gift shop where we bought a Southeast tshirt WITH THE NAME OF OUR VERY OWN TOWN ON IT.
Later we grabbed a hot dog and some M&Ms and wandered over to the media area where Joe, who is a broadcast journalism major, spotted one of his heroes, Major League Baseball analyst, Tim Kurkjian.
Then as luck would have it, we ran into a local DC news reporter who asked if we'd like to be interviewed about the community's excitement about the team. Joe was all in because he doesn't get nervous, but I was a little unsure. Then the reporter told me that he was stunned that Joe and I were mother and son. He had been sure that we were brother and sister.
After the reporter got over his COMPLETE SHOCK AND AWE he said, "Cool. We'll talk to Joe about playing for Loudoun South in the early days and then to you about the baseball mom perspective."
At that point, I thought long and hard about it for about 3.5 seconds, threw my M&Ms and diet coke on the ground, sidled right on up next to the microphone, and was pretty much like this:
Despite my charm and stage presence, as it turns out Joe's interview was aired on the 11 o'clock news that night and mine was cut out.
Let's just say, I played more of a . . . um . . . supporting role.
Hey Channel 9:
No big deal. We were here for the baseball, so we found our way to the stands and watched the rest of the International game. I put on my "throwback" Loudoun South baseball cap and proceeded to snap way more selfies than a grown woman should.
With a little help from some friends who spotted us and saved us some seats we ended up making our way to sit only a few rows behind our Loudoun South parents for the big game vs. Hawaii. I was thrilled to hug and congratulate some friends and listen to all the amazing stories of their experiences in Williamsport. The game didn't start out so great for us as we ended up down 8-2 pretty early, so some would have thought this would be a blow out. Our boys have no quit in them though and before we knew it they had clawed and fought their way back to tie it up.
Unfortunately, things started to get a little dicey again and our boys were down a few runs. At that point, Joe says to me, "Little Henson is warming up in the bullpen."
Little Henson is the little brother of a kid Joe had played Little League with about eight or nine years ago. I knew Little Henson when he was 3 or 4 years old playing in the dirt while his older brother was on the field. Now, he was about to pitch on prime time ESPN. When he trotted out to the mound Joe and I pretty much lost our minds.
This was a high pressure situation and I couldn't help but think of this kid as a mere toddler. Then that "toddler" went and pitched two scoreless innings. LIKE A BOSS.
In the end our boys battled their little rear ends off, but ended up losing 12-8. They held their heads high and handled the loss with grace and hope for the next game. We hugged and high fived our friends good-bye. Joe drove us all the way home while I slept in the back seat since I had worn myself slap out by cheering and worrying about all those kids as if they were my very own flesh and blood.
Without question, our day at the Little League World Series was one of the most fun experiences not only of this summer, but perhaps of any summer. I've been to Fenway Park where I watched Big Papi hit a homerun. I've watched the Washington Nationals from the fancy suites. And still, there is no venue I would rank above Lamade Stadium in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. It is truly a field of dreams.
At end of the day, it wasn't the beautiful field, the electric atmosphere, the bright lights, the famous reporters, or the Major Leaguers in the booth that made our day. Above all else, it was the thirteen of you.
You - with your big hearts and your big fight. You - with your humility and charm and perfect manners on tv in front of millions. You - with your support of each other, your fierce determination, and the ferocious way you went about your business. You - who inspired our family to sit around the kitchen and remember stories of plays and errors and triumphs from the boys' days playing Little League. You - who made us shake our heads in wonder and smile and clap our hands in delight when we spotted you on tv.
It was you, boys. As the days of summer started to fade, I decided to bring the first Little Leaguer whose cleats I tied tight and whose basehits I cheered to one last ball game before he left for college. And it was you who gave us one of the most memorable and fun experiences that we have had together in the twenty years I have been his mama. Oh boy, did we have a day.
You lived out the dreams of so many right before our very eyes. Thank you for doing it so well. Welcome home, kiddos.
 |
| Photo Credit: George J Puskar |
No comments:
Post a Comment