Recently, things haven't been going so great for me. Events, feelings, and other bits of randomness have left me in a nasty hole. In order to combat some of this darkness, I have tried to conjure up the memories that I like and focus on them instead of the stuff that brings me down.
Here's one that stands out in particular:
In the late 1980's, I don't remember the exact summer it was, I was sent out to spend some time with an aunt that was living in San Francisco. I remember having a good time overall, but one event has left a lasting impression. A baseball game.
We crossed the Bay Bridge into Oakland, because the A's were playing at home and her beloved San Francisco Giants were elsewhere. I can't remember who the A's were playing, but that detail is minor, and who cares, it's not the point anyway. Our seats were incredible. Best I've ever had. First row of the upper deck, directly behind home plate. I could see everything, and as a 9 year old, everything was immaculate.
At some point during the middle of the game, my aunt and her boyfriend at the time left to go get food and beers. This might seem odd today, as leaving a small child who lives 3500 miles away alone at a ballgame in Oakland is probably the worst idea of all time. But it happened. So I'm there, alone, with two seats open to my left and a bunch of strangers around me. I can only imagine that these strangers were generally good people, baseball fans, and cool with being a crowd of babysitters for 15 minutes. I know that I would be protective of a child in that situation, but that's because I have goodness locked away in this husk of a soul.
Anyway, Rickey Henderson came to bat. He is still one of my favorite players of all time. I'm leaning against the railing, trying to see everything as well as my tiny eyes can manage. Then it happens. The moment every fan dreams about. The crack of the bat, the groan of the crowd. The ball popping up straight back into foul territory. Hands reach out. My arm stretches to my left as far as it can. My arms were short, and I had no glove, so when the ball landed in my aunt's boyfriends seat, literally two seats away from me, I came up empty and it bounded away. A few minutes later, as the disappointment of not catching the closest foul ball I have ever seen (to this day, mind you) faded, a tap came on my shoulder. I turned to see an older man, probably in his 60's, with a ball in his hand.
He held it out. "Here you go, bud. Take it!" And I did. He just...GAVE me the ball! I held it, examined it, searched every inch, every stitch, and felt every scuff. It was so bright, so smooth. The seams were rich red and the printing so clean. Nothing like the crap baseballs I played Little League with or used to toss around with my friends. This was art. I was in love with this baseball. On top of that, it was hit by my favorite player. I was on top of the world. My aunt and her boyfriend came back with hot dogs, beers, and other baseball game snacks, but my focus was on the ball.
I must have smiled so big that people thought I was some weird foreign kid who had no idea what this small sphere was, but liked it anyway. I remember thinking that nothing would top that. That older man had no reason to give me the ball. He could have kept it, given it to his family, or sold it as memorabilia. Instead, he thought it would have been good to give it to me. For no good reason.
That random act of generosity has stuck with me ever since. It was a truly kind moment, from a stranger to a child. Nowadays, it might be tinted with a creepy oddness that would make you wonder about the motivations of that man. Nowadays, I wouldn't have been left alone in those seats. Nowadays, we are far more cynical than we were back then.
Random acts of goodness, no matter how pure the motive, are always seen with a more pessimistic lens today, and it really makes me sad. Why can't we just be good to one another? Baseball provided me a moment of true goodness. Maybe it was the innocence of being a child, or maybe I just hadn't gotten my ass kicked enough yet to see bad things. In the moment, there were none of those notions, nothing dirty, or mean, or antagonistic about the situation at all. To me, and in my memory, that man just did something nice for a kid who really liked baseball.
Maybe he just wanted to enhance my game experience. Maybe he wanted to ensure that my love of baseball was cemented with a ball. Maybe he just didn't want to carry the thing around with him for the rest of the day. I didn't care, and I didn't think about it. I just thanked him, and stared at it with that youthful glee that has been scraped off by the passing years.
No matter how disappointed I have gotten with things, and no matter how low I might sink into my own head, I can pull up this memory and realize that not everything is crap. Sometimes a random act of goodness occurs. Sometimes the bad stuff can subside when we remember the kind old man who gives us a baseball.
A Rickey Henderson baseball.
SD
