Baseball - America's pastime. Hot dogs and peanuts and lazy summer days. Sweet Lou and Alan Trammell turning another double play. From childhood I have fond memories of playing and watching baseball whether in person or on TV.
Somewhere along the way I've lost my connection to the game because I find it too slow to watch on TV and I've only been to two major league games since 1998. My days of playing are practically over, unless I join a beer and softball league again.
However I won't let it go away alltogether. I'm still connected in two ways. One, I have coached my two oldest children in softball and baseball. I actually enjoy the dugout chatter and the back and forth with the kids more than the games themselves since the skill levels are low. Second, I've read a couple of books by David Halberstam that are just about perfect. One is called October 1964, which chronicles the World Series between the Yankees and Cardinals. The second is Summer of '49, which recounts the Yankees/Red Sox pennant race.
I think the late Halberstam's greatest gift was weaving together the historical setting, the characters, and what happened on the field. If I were a literature professor I would ask aspiring history writers to read these books and ask them to report back to me in my messy office.
No comments:
Post a Comment