Softball: A Contemplative Year-End Pep-Talk
Dear People,
On a dark and dreary day and for the last game of the year, my team baptized Chris Fure's in a brackish pond of failure foam, and I think I know why. The hard truth is that the Furinator's contingent was rudderless from the get-go, and frankly, once my own side jumped out to an 11-0 3rd-inning lead, I was scandalized to see that the only thing Chris was doing to galvanize his shell-shocked posse was to pass out a bunch of Mint-o-Green Life Savers, as if their problems were somehow rooted in recreational halitosis.
Ironically, their problems may indeed have been rooted in recreational halitosis, for over the next several innings they fought back with a surprisingly dignified rigor, and even pulled to within four in the bottom of the 8th. Alas, though, breath mints alone are not an athletic tactic, a strategy or even a worthy replacement for inter-inning Listerine, and thus, even though I strayed from the comfort of my usual 1st-base perch to play nearly half the game at shortstop, they eventually went down, and down hard, 12-7.
The point is that as we pass into the new year and rapidly head toward the 19th anniversary of our founding as the finest unaffiliated email-organized softball community West of the Sacramento River, we'll continue to evolve in dramatic and unexpected ways, as both individual players and as a dynamic recreational folk. For example, I assume that my own recent multi-inning calamity-avoiding foray into that crown jewel of infield ramparts means that I'll soon be replacing Shabel, Laddish and McGuire at short (And I'm not saying just because they sound like the finest criminal law firm on the planet).
More broadly, it's already clear that we'll face another year of grave challenges, from injury and bickering to the usual blend of ceaseless park interlopers. There will also be threats from the Department of Parks and Wreck, bitter neighbors and those nutso medieval fetishists with their 13th-century war games, but most ominously, we will likely once again find ourselves splayed nude before nature with all her softball-loathing ways-from rain and more rain to locusts and civilization-destroying meteorites. Yet we're nothing if not resilient, which means that if circumstances both brutal and bitter force us to switch from our cherished pastime to darts, sturgeon fishing or even lederhosen-only chess-boxing, then that's what we'll do. Yeah, Berkeley strong. And therefore there will be a game at Codornices this Sunday at 11, IF I get enough commits by this Friday morning . . . Raymond
1/1/16
Softball: Onward
Dear People,
There will be a game at Codornices this Sunday at 11, and as of now there are still six slots left. You are therefore welcome to commit any non-community players of reputable character, including your distant relatives, cherished friends, and, as always, embittered ex-lovers.
Please bring $4 for the field (which just for the record, is still $4 in 2015 dollars), and may your new year be filled with 1,000 triples…Raymond 845-7552