CHANGES & TIME

CHANGES & TIME

No surprise, really. It happens every year. June comes, then July, and the realization sets in that half the year has gone by.

This year it hit me, like being brushed by a feather. June ended, no big note of the halfway point. Elsewhere I did read in another blog that the writer was slightly more than stunned that it was the 3rd Quarter already.

Then it was July, and I made mention to Susan, as I do each year, that this coming New Year's Eve, and the party we attend each year, is closer than the last one we attended. And we discussed going to a Baseball game with our New Year's Eve hosts, as we do each Summer. But the passing of half the year seemed to have had minimal impact, at best.

Suddenly, with a jolt, and like that proverbial bolt from the blue, how much time has elapsed hit me like a brick.

Maybe it was going to Yankee Stadium last weekend. Saturday was Old Timers Day (more about that will be posted in a day ot two over at my other blog, DeanOnBaseball [1]. This year was the 25th since the death of Yankee Captain and catcher Thurman Munson. The people who put together the Old Timers Day ceremonies managed to reunite the core of that 1979 team. In a moving moment, capping off the ceremonies, Munson's teammates from that 1979 Yankee team encircled the outfield perimeter of pitcher's mound, as Diane Munson, widow of Thurman, threw out the first pitch of the Old Timers Day game. It was very moving.

I still recall, so vividly, the moment of silence in Munson's memory before the game that followed the day of the plane crash. Bob Sheperd, the voice of Yankee Stadium (some say the voice of God!), asked the fans to watch a memorial on the Center field scoreboard, and then observe a moment of silence. That moment ended up being closer to five minutes, as the Yankees on the field were unable to stop sobbing. Most of all I recall Bobby Murcer in Left Field and Lou Piniella in Right Field, both of them so upset, streams of tears falling from their eyes to the grassy outfield ground.

Never before had I seen such an expression of love and caring from this group of professional athletes, these macho guys. The loss of Munson and the outpouring of emotion it evoked was unlike anything I'd seen. Perhaps the loss of Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King had been similar.
But this was different. Athletes, guys mostly in their 20s and 30s, so overwhelmed with grief, and showing it publicly, with no care as to how open and visible, televised and reported upon it would be.

Memories of this came back in droves as this Old Timers Day unfolded at the Stadium this year.

It reminded me of where I was 25 years ago. I had just moved to Brooklyn Heights, afer living right across from Brooklyn's Prospect Park, near the zoo, by the Lincoln Road subway stop. This is just short of half my life ago.

Life is very different now. I never miss Old Timers Day, Opening day, and usually we always go to the final regualr season home game at the Stadium as well. We share a season ticket package with friends, and take in many games each Summer.

Back in 1979 and 1980 there was a teenager in the building, living with his mother. The kid's father gave him a pair of season tickets to the Stadium, and he posted a sign in the elevator looking to unload some of them. I bought a bunch of them. Then his mother, realizing that I could be the adult chaperone for her son as he took the subway to Yankee Stadium and back, bestowed a good many more tickets on me, with the caveat that I would protect her son from subway ruffians or any other bad elements one might encounter on the trip to and from yankee Stadium.

I went to a ton of games those two Summers.

Retrospect is a curious thing. I mention this teenage kid from 1979 and 1980. That's 24 and 25 years ago. In my mind's eye I still see that kid; he was maybe 15 years old. Now he would be a 40 year old man. But in my mind, he remains that quiet kid who also loved the Yanks, who barely said a word all Summer.

Then came last night -- that All Star Game. That signals the halfway point in the Baseball season. Of course, it being on FOX-TV, it also signals how very bad FOX coverage is of the sport. The year half gone, the baseball season half over, 25 years since the death of Munson.

Where did the time go?

Should I be playing (or linking to)Uncle John's Band or Touch of Gray? A quick check shows that Archive.org [2] has both [3] tunes [4].

Changes occur over time. Now I consider going to Yankee Stadium both a joy and a mission worthy of considerable pre-planning analysis, preparation, and execution. Used to be you got there, either via subway or car (if by car, one parked in any of the garages), either with tickets in hand or readily available from the scalpers, and found one's seats. Nowadays, since September 11th, the security at the Stadium is intense. No backpacks or canvas bags allowed - and no bags at all other than clear plastic bags. Don't have one? They supply it.

Each fan entering the Stadium is checked for electronic gadgets. Show the security guard that's really a cell phone, digital camera, or radio. No cans of soda are allowed, although they do look the other way at semi-soft plastic soda and water bottles.

It takes longer to enter and get to one's seat . . . much like getting on a plane these days. When it is hot and sticky and the heat and humidity are thick, a casual trip to take in a ball game becomes more of a military-like planning maneuver.

There is, still, the joy of the game.

As long as I can recall, baseball, particularly the Yankees (even in their sad days, like when CBS owned them) has been a source of entertainment, interest, curiosity, and a diversion from any stress or strain. As a little boy going to games with my father, as a teenager, even during my longhair hippie phase, there was always baseball.

Funny how in the Old Timers Game, there are players showing up that I took my son to see when he first started attending games. Don Mattingly, many years now retired as a player, and in his first season as the Yanks' Batting Coach, was one of my son's original favorite Yankees. Now Mattingly and some of his teammates are old timers.

Time marches on.

And it seems like the winds of change are blowing, perhaps even howling. More on that in future posts.