Baseball Season

There's something about driving past the baseball diamonds in the summer that really stir up some good memories for me. We had 7 kids in our family so you grew up watching your siblings do pretty much everything. You got dragged everywhere. Someone always had a piano recital, choir concert, volleyball game, basketball game, baseball game, soccer game, swim meet, school play, you name it. We were always going somewhere. Baseball games were the best because there was so much freedom. We got to play at the park with all of our friends, catch foul balls, find money to spend at the concession. We got to run around.

This all began with my Dad. He was President of Lethbridge Southwest Little League for years, and was on the committee for 20 years before he eventually "retired" (we all know he still keeps his nose involved somehow!) He coached Shane, Steve, TJ, Brody, and many other teams my brothers never played on. My childhood best friend, Maggie, was my partner in crime because our brothers were always on the same team. We would hunt for foul balls and trade them in for double bubble gums. Sometimes our mom's would give us money to get a treat at the concession, or we'd run off to Turbo to get a slurpee or 5 cent candies. We would grab a full bag of spitz, suck the flavoring off and spit them out in the bathroom.

I would go and sit in the dug out with all the boys and they would teach me baseball talk, "here we go TJ here we go" " good eye buddy good eye". I thought my dad was so special when he coached, and I felt so special that I got to sit in there with the team. I would run errands for him, chasing after balls, filling up water bottles, finding bats, getting gloves. The dug out was my favorite place to be.

Even as a teenager my summer job consisted of doing all the data entry for Lethbridge Southwest Little League. Entering registrations, entering teams and tournament schedules, paying their bills, doing their bookkeeping. It was baseball all day all summer.

Do I like watching baseball on TV? Not really... but there's something about sitting out in the sun with a bag of spitz and a hot dog watching a game that is just absolutely perfect. Take me out to the ball game!

Maggie (3 yrs), Kylie (2 1/2 yrs)