Baseball

Baseball.   For generations, it has been a foundation of relationships between men and boys here in America.  Through baseball, men pass on the values of teamwork, sportsmanship and love of a little white sphere flying off a bat or popping into a glove.  It’s a shared experience that builds bonds of friendship and love across generations, one that transcends language and cultures.  I bet that Abner Doubleday never dreamed that the game that he was credited with inventing would grow to be so much more than a sport.  I love baseball and have since I was a little kid playing rec ball in school yards and later little league.

When my son Chris was young, we used to play catch and I’d go to all his games and practices, starting late in the winter and on through the spring and summer.  I still remember Coach Carr teaching Chris and his teammates basic skills of hitting and fielding while snowflakes were still flying.  I’d take Chris to Salem Avalanche games and later Salem Red Sox games - more than a hundred of them over the years.  But it's been awhile since I experienced the joy of playing catch or watching a game with a young boy.  

All that changed earlier this year when I discovered that my young Ukrainian friend Egor Shulym was just as much of a sports nut as I am.  Egor is 8 and is a gifted, natural athlete.   This was clear the first time I took a little white ball and two baseball gloves out of my trunk.  One glove was my Rawlings Jim LeFebvre basket-weave model that I’ve owned since I was about 10.  I bought it with money I earned cutting grass, raking leaves and shoveling snow.  It’s been sitting in a closet for far too long and needed a bit of leather conditioner, but was in pretty good shape.  I let Egor slip it on his left hand and in a few minutes we were zipping the ball back and forth like we’d done it for years.  For just a moment, I was 10 again too.  It was magic.

No longer in a closet - my old Rawlings Glove

My buddy Egor - he's a natural ball player

A few weeks ago, I was invited to a picnic atop Mill Mountain to meet some new Ukrainian families who have recently arrived in Roanoke as refugees.   They are young couples with young kids about Egor’s age, learning to live and navigate American society and culture while also struggling to learn a new language and missing the home and life in Ukraine.  Egor and his mom Jenya were there and Egor had brought the two baseball gloves and a ball with him, intent on snagging a game of catch with me.  So as we started zipping the ball back and forth, the other kids came over and before long, we had them playing too.  Then their Dad’s came over and put on baseball gloves for the first time in their lives.  Within minutes, kids and dads who have never seen or played baseball were laughing and playing, and not a word was needed to translate the sheer joy of playing a game of catch.  Abner Doubleday would sure be proud, as was I, just to be a part of it.  I love baseball.  I love sharing it with my new Ukrainian friends.  What a game.

My new Ukrainian friends

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