Читать книгу We've Been Here All Along: Autistics Over 35 Speak Out in Poetry and Prose - Rachel Inc. Cohen-Rottenberg - Страница 7

As my first-grade year was coming to a close, the flyers announcing the 1972 Little League season were distributed. Should I give it a try? Why not? My father had, in fact, played professional baseball in the 1950s, so I hesitantly said, “Yes.”

Most of us boys in the first grade were seven years old, and we were placed in what was called the minor league. There were four teams: Reds, Pirates, Tigers, and Yankees. I am not sure how teams were selected, but I landed on the Yankees team coached by big-framed Butch. Butch had had a lot of experience coaching Little League, and he knew how to run a team. And he knew how to maintain respect.

After he had tested our fielding skills by batting the ball to each of us in turn, I was selected for the outfield. The outfield was where you went if you were lousy at catching the ball since, at this young age, very few players could hit balls that far. That was fine by me, for I had better things to do in that lonely outfield. Turning around I could watch airplanes take off from the adjacent runway of the regional airport.

“Turn around, Tim!” was an imperative I heard on many occasions. But I didn’t care. I was busy counting airplanes and watching the magical aerodynamic lift of those Cessnas and Piper Cubs. Then there was that incredible roaring growl of the engine as a newly airborne plane struggled to climb toward the clouds. That was fun. But not the baseball game. It was not fun. It could be hell.

Trying to swing the bat at the correct moment as the ball zoomed over the plate, and making sure the bat was swinging horizontally through the correct altitude of the vertical plane, and trying to keep my eye on the ball at the same time as making sure my bat was where it was supposed to be was difficult and…“Strike One!” How could that be strike one? I hadn’t even swung the bat.

“Just watch the ball,” Dad always said, and swing…“Strike Two!” Okay, that didn’t work either. More than once, at this critical moment, I would look toward the lawn chairs down the first base line where Mom and Dad were sitting. Dad would give me that raised eyebrow with a half smile and a look of “Remember what I told you. You can do it!” I would watch the pitcher launch the ball at what seemed like 200 miles per hour, and hear my bat softly and slowly swish over the plate one second after the ball had smacked the catcher’s mitt.

“Strike Three. You’re out!”

I can’t begin to tell you how many times I heard that exclamation behind home plate. Then there was that long walk back to the worn-out bench where my teammates were anxiously awaiting their turns to hit a line drive toward second base. I, on the other hand, quickly earned my way into the ranks of the “Easy Out Club.” For some reason, I just could not seem to hit that ball, although Dad had worked with me a lot.

Sometimes, I got by with luck. By not swinging at the ball, I might get walked — especially by the not-so-skilled kids who threw pitches that even I perceived to be a ball. Those were my glory moments at the plate. After hearing the heavenly “Ball Four,” I made plenty of home plate umpires and catchers run for cover as I abruptly launched my bat in the air. Where it landed was anybody’s guess. But it didn’t matter. I was safe on first base.

All was well for the moment — but then the next batter took the plate, and the confusion began.

Should I lead off first base in anticipation of second? If I did lead off, how would I know when I was supposed to steal second? How was I to know whether I was supposed to step back on first? How was I to know…?

This was not my comfort zone; it was my confusion zone. There were too many signals coming from too many people. Were those hand signals for me or for the boy on our team trying to steal third base? Or were the signals for the other team?

“Run, Tim!” barked the coach, three seconds after the crack of the bat.

While most kids improved, I did not. Baseball was not going to be a sport I was good at. I was below average and miserable with it. But it was too awkward for me to tell my parents I didn’t want to play anymore. They assumed I wanted to play. I didn’t know until years later that it didn’t matter to them whether I played or not.

At the close of that first baseball season, in the late summer of 1972, our team had finished in first place. I can assure you that I had nothing to do with the victorious season. But I was part of the team, and I got to share the benefits of the prize — a trip to watch the Cincinnati Reds play a home game at Riverfront Stadium. It was not until many years later that I learned the significance of what I had witnessed.

I heard members of our team talking about the upcoming game. It didn’t interest me. But there was something they talked about that did — the awesome and incredible Bat Bank at the Riverfront Stadium souvenir shop. I had a clear image of the Bat Bank in my mind, and I planned on buying one.

On Saturday, October 14, I was on the road in Butch’s over-crowded van with a load of fellow teammates heading down U.S. 52 along the Ohio River. On our way, we passed a scene of horror that haunts me to this day. On Kellogg Avenue, at the edge of Cincinnati, were the skeletal remains of Coney Island Amusement Park, a place of magic. I had ridden my first roller coaster, the Teddy Bear, there in 1971. After the savagery of the wrecking ball, the Teddy Bear now lay intertwined in a heap of pealing lattice work with its big brother, the Shooting Star.

While the other boys looked ahead through the windshield for the first glimpse of Riverfront Stadium, my head was turned around to look out the rear window and say goodbye to an old friend.

Sitting in the nosebleed section of Riverfront, my eyes strained to watch Johnny Bench catch 90 mile-per-hour fastballs from Gary Nolan. Much to the home crowd’s dismay, Gene Tenace hit two home runs, and the Big Red Machine lost to the Oakland A’s. Years later I realized what I had witnessed — the opening game of the 1972 World Series! No wonder there had been such pomp and circumstance before the opening pitch.

After that game, I felt like a sardine smashed up against the bustling crowd. Butch took us to the souvenir shop where we were prepared to buy a memory. I could not focus on anyone in my group. It was a static-like blur of confusion, a mad whirlwind of relentless bees buzzing about my personal space, swarming madly, while I tried to focus on finding that Bat Bank. But where was it? I couldn’t find it anywhere in that cramped store. I looked and looked and looked… until I almost gave up. I saw the other boys with sacks filing out of the shop. They must have found their Bat Banks. Why couldn’t I? But I didn’t give up. I went to the man behind the cash register and asked him where the Bat Bank was.

“Just a moment,” he said as he finished with a customer.

He soon shuffled over to one of the shelves I had previously investigated and brought me a Bat Bank. “What? That’s not the Bat Bank,” I thought to myself. But the sales clerk was not mistaken. It was the Bat Bank — a six-inch-tall red cone with a coin hole on top surrounded by a multitude of miniature baseball bats. Inscribed on the plastic bats were the names of each team of the National and American Leagues.

Yes, it made sense now — sort of. The Bat Bank, in my mind, was supposed to be made of glass and shaped like the flying mammals that lived deep in caves. That was what I had been searching for. And to this day, I can still see what that bank was supposed to look like, for its image is forever engraved in my mind, along with the skeletal remains on those barren midways back on Kellogg Avenue.

The following year brought with it a faint glimmer of hope. Dad drove me to Newberry’s Sporting Goods in Portsmouth, Ohio, to let me pick out a new glove. With my added height, Dad thought I might make a good first or second baseman. He had worked with me a lot in the backyard, and I was getting pretty good at catching the ball. He even bought me one of those elastic pitch-and-catch nets so that I could practice.

Dad had talked with my new coach, Mr. Whittaker, who was in charge of the team I had been selected to play on for the 1973 season — the Tigers. My beautiful new glove was purchased. It was a Wilson’s first baseman’s glove. And at the first practice of the season, with Dad’s influence — and after proving I could catch the ball — I was the Tiger’s new first baseman.

First base was a busy little place. Turning around to watch planes take off could mean getting beaned on the head. I learned to watch the batter — and the ball. And with Dad’s help in the backyard, I became a good first baseman, rarely missing a throw my way. But the struggles at bat remained and would never go away. And even though first base was a proper niche for me, I still dreaded every game and prayed for rain. God listened to me only one time. On game days, I can remember lying on the couch, hoping I could go to sleep and my parents would forget to wake me up for a game. But they never forgot. From the moment I woke up, I dreaded those games. I watched the clock in horror as the hour hand crept ever closer to the hour of doom. But I managed, and eventually the season was nearing its close.

At the end of the 1973 season, the league had planned a father/son wheelbarrow baseball game. The rules of the game were the same, except that the son would hit the ball, jump in the wheelbarrow, and be pushed around the bases by his father.

Before the game, a beautiful ten-speed bike was given away in a drawing. How many times one’s name got put in the box depended upon how many candy bars one sold during the season. Some kid on one of the other teams was sure he was going to win because his parents had personally bought over a hundred dollars in chocolate bars just for the sake of skewing the drawing. I held my breath as the winner’s name was announced. It wasn’t mine. But ironically, it wasn’t the name of the kid whose parents had bought the ton of sweets either. The winner was a kid who had, in fact, sold very few chocolate bars. However, the other child’s parents didn’t go away empty handed, for they had added ten pounds of girth to their waist lines!

Now, I can testify to the fact that it was difficult to defend first base with a burly father carting a son-filled wheelbarrow toward me. But this game was meant to be for laughs, not for the usual screaming parents yelling obscene remarks at the officials for conspiring against their sons. No, this game was for fun. But it wasn’t much fun for one father named Harold and his son, Kevin.

After Kevin had come to the plate and hit the ball, he promptly jumped into the wheelbarrow as his father began the mad dash toward me. “Safe!” yelled the umpire. There was no doubt about it; he was safe. I wasn’t standing in the way of that thing, for I had enough common sense not to. After the next hit, another son-filled wheelbarrow came my way. And Harold and Kevin were safe on second, followed by another hit that placed them on third. With home plate looming ahead of them, red-headed Harold dug his heels into the tread-marked scarred earth in preparation for his fatherly duties of becoming a hero. The crack of the bat could be heard all the way to the distant airport restaurant. The wheelbarrow blasted off, and all I could see was a red streak caroming to home plate as Harold’s crimson beard flopped in the breeze. “Safe!” Harold was stoked. That beard was madly oscillating up and down as Harold tried to regulate his air supply.

Finally, it was our team’s turn at bat. Harold, who refused to wear the appropriate face gear, got the opportunity to play catcher as his son pitched. He cocked his head back and awaited the next victim of their star pitcher. But we Tigers had some pretty good batters, and it wasn’t long before one of them launched a ball toward the fence. The explosion of the crowd could be heard all the way to the neighboring town seven miles away. “Roll that boy!” came the cheers. And roll they did — around first, second, and third bases as a wild throw from center field ended in a tremendous smack into Harold’s ill-fitting glove.

The wheelbarrow was closing in on home plate, and Harold decided to become not just a hero, but an Olympian. Straddling the plate, his scraggly form blocked the incoming rolling mass. A wide-eyed boy rode helplessly as his brawny father refused to be intimidated by the flopping beard of the catcher. But Harold would not budge.

Kaboom! Harold got run over. And from his great Olympian nose came the outpouring of a crimson river that sent shivers down our spines. “Oohs” and “aahs” reverberated off the concession-stand roof while a herd of cattle in the neighboring field watched in utter horror.

The first to arrive on the scene was Harold’s wife. As she comforted her husband, he seemed like a rag doll helplessly flitting in the wind. But he accepted her comfort, and then he rode to the hospital. Fortunately, he suffered only a broken nose, and that episode officially marked the end of the 1973 baseball season.

I remained on the Tigers’ team for the 1974 season. And it seems only fitting that this final year of my baseball career should end as it had begun — with our team coming in first place. The prize that year consisted of a shiny little trophy awarded at a cookout hosted by our team’s new coach, Mr. Evans.

Besides our team victory, three memorable things happened that final season. First, I got a double. It was a fluke, in a way. The pitcher released the ball, and my uncontrolled swing somehow connected. The ball was catapulted in an elegant arc that landed between the right and center fielders. Then, it rolled almost to the fence. I can still feel that solid sting of the ash bat rippling down my arms. I now knew what it was supposed to feel like to get a hit.

The second event was even more remarkable. It was the final game of the season. I hit a dainty little hit that barely made it to the pitcher’s mound. As I unenthusiastically made my way to first base expecting to get out, the ball flew out of the pitcher’s hand with such force that it landed near the parents sitting on the sideline. I was now heading toward second base. Again, the ball was thrown too high, allowing me to find third base. “Run,Tim! Run! Run!” I ran — all the way to home plate with a baseball closing in behind me. I didn’t know how to slide, so I just trotted across the plate and found my seat on the old wooden bench. I had gotten my first and only home run.

The third event happened in that same game. While I was guarding first base, a high fly ball was coming between the second baseman and myself. I decided to catch it. The second baseman had the same plan. We collided in the middle, and I got a fat lip as a souvenir. I turned and, without hesitation, walked off the field to sit down between Mom and Dad.

I was finished with baseball.