WORLD SERIES

Reflection is like shit, it just happens. The older you get, the more you have to reflect upon and even if you don’t go there it will come back around and there you are. On my early morning swims you might think it would get tedious, back and forth, up and down the lanes. I touch the wall with one hand, catch an extra breath in the turn and go the other way. I am generally aware that the water is deeper at one end than the other, changing the mechanics of my turn but it’s a redundant, repetitious exercise. Still, there is nothing boring about it. The mind, at least the one I have, goes into default mode during  autopilot. I pay attention to stroke mechanics and notice changes in the fit/feel of goggles and ear plugs but that only lasts so long. On autopilot, very quickly, something will come to mind that I hadn’t prearranged. Then I let that new thought unreel itself, begging new questions and testing old understandings. By the end of the swim I will have reflected on a dozen experiences or ideas that I hadn’t prepared for. 

This morning, with air bubbling out of my nose, I realized that I didn’t know who won the baseball game last night. It's the last week of October, the only baseball is the World Series and the Kansas City Royals are American League Champions. They beat the New York Mets in 14 innings on Tuesday and were ahead last night when I went to bed. But I’d have to finish my swim before I could find out for sure. I do love baseball; it’s the first game I learned to play. I’m really not much of a sports fan anymore, must have spent that enthusiasm in an earlier life. I keep track of who wins but not compelled to watch them play. 

Swimming on autopilot and I’m thinking about baseball, but that’s how it works. Then another realization, I skew off in a new direction. When I was playing baseball that’s what it was all about, playing the game. You want to win but win or lose, you still want to play. I’d be disappointed when we lost but never unreconcilable. Tomorrow will be a new day and we can play again. I’m out of sync with my peers who live or die with wins or losses, whatever the game. After all, that’s why they keep score isn’t it? I think it goes deeper than that. Those people who fill stadiums in their home colors, immersed in that culture, there must be a need to identify with something greater than they are, to identify with others who mirror the same enthusiasm, loyal to a glorious or bitter end. It’s a tribal kind of thing where you can become a small part of something grand that doesn’t really need you. I don’t object to that principle but I was an average player who kept playing because somebody kept giving me a uniform. Since I was good enough to turn a double play and to hit a hanging curve, I’ve never been a good spectator. If I can’t play, I can read the box score later. 

I have friends who meet on a roof-top bar on Wednesday evenings, smoke cigars and sip whiskey at the end of happy hour. It’s a pretty heady group where conversations go wide and deep. Last night we were all wearing jackets, sitting under a propane heater with the baseball game on the big screen. We weren’t watching the game but then, we weren’t ignoring it either. With a runner on 1st, the Mets batter nailed a hard shot that might have gone through into left field but the Royal’s player smothered it, kept it in front of his body. The predicament was pure. In order to turn the double play, three fielders would have to perform with absolute perfection. Bam-bam-bam; the way the ball moved glove to glove it looked like special effects from a George Lucas movie. Instead of having runners in scoring position, the Mets were set down with no damage done. It’s true, to see the very best do their best, you have to watch big leaguers and I marvel at their skills. Still, I was just a spectator. I had no skin in the game. That was them and it was perfect. I was just me, on a rooftop, jawing with friends. 

I think it’s a throw back to Rome, the coliseum and gladiators. Spectators got to go thumbs up or down, whether or not the victorious gladiator should slay or spare his foe. Their influence gave them connection to the outcome. When sports fans talk about their team they use the pronoun “We” as if their names were in the program. Crowd noise has become the ‘thumbs down’ in an effort to intimidate or complicate communication by the other team. It’s understood. Home teams have come to count on it and I hate it. Professional sport is not sport; they've made a lucrative business out of a kid's game. Our sports heroes are businessmen and the game is serious business. 

It only takes a few seconds for me to process all this rationale as I move closer to the wall, glance at the clock and decide which stroke I want to use on the next lap. I like it when the Royals win but it has little to do with identity. The only team loyalty I recognize is to the University of Michigan. Even then I don’t watch and I don’t fret when they lose. In college, both baseball and football, our coaches played down winning. The message we kept hearing was that winning will take care of itself; that what you need to be focused on is preparation. In my experience the day after was a new day, win or lose.  What was worse than losing was not getting to play. That’s what I took with me from the pool today.