I have been a baseball fan since birth. I mean, it wasn’t the cliché tale of my father putting an infant sized baseball cap on my head the moment I left the womb, but you get it. Growing up, my parents introduced me to my first true love: the San Francisco Giants. I would literally race home, turn on the television, and watch the afternoon game after school. On the reg.
I recently published a post about love.
What I forgot to mention in doing so, is the fact that America’s past time truly helped me understand the meaning of unconditional love. And kind of shaped me as a human being.
I know it sounds dramatic.
After all, ‘It’s only a game…‘
But over the years, baseball taught me patience, loyalty, forgiveness, passion, and most importantly how to love, unconditionally.
The San Francisco Giants haven’t always been the best team in baseball (statistically). And it’s true that this season they continue to disappoint the fair-weather fans that became interested in the sport only after a few world series championships. When I first fell in love, the boys were, uh, god awful? That would explain my past dating history… But we had character. JT Snow, Benito Santiago, Jeff Kent, and Barry Bonds. These were my hero’s, and it never mattered that we lost more games than we won.
I would still show up for every afternoon to support the boys in black and orange. And this has continued throughout my life. Sure, life gets busy. I fall behind with statistics, new players on the roster, and the politics of it all.
But you can bet your ass when the boys showed up on the east coast, I would be in attendance.
Not once, but twice.
I felt at peace after taking my seat at Citi Field. Sure, it’s no AT&T park, but the boys were there. The giraffe was within rows of me, and Buster smacked one out of the park. I was surrounded by hundreds of fans from the Bay Area (that’s New York for you, the ol’ melting pot).
There are not many moments in your life that you would be willing to admit fully consume you. I find myself unable to control my excitement, disappointment, or straight up fear (mainly due to foul balls) when I am at a baseball game. I am out of my seat, hesitating a fly ball, willing it to drop. I throw my hands in the air in disbelief, in anger or celebration.
Similarly to being in love, I lead with my heart in baseball. Even if my head is telling me we’re down by seven in the bottom of the 9th. My heart is still pulling for a ‘torturous’ inning. A comeback if you will. Spoiler alert:
We lost both games.
And yet, in the worlds of Celine Dion, ‘My heart will go on…’