Y2K, or Why 2K?

[David HK]

 

Why 2K? 
I was surprised when I noticed how that tally had grown.  Didn’t even realize that something of a milestone was approaching.  So I’ve held off posting for a couple of days to compose these thoughts.  (And believe me, at my age, composing my thoughts is a near-Herculean effort).

 

I’m so far from home, from the barren plains of ND.  From the crackling, in-and-out radio under my covers, when the closest radio station carrying games was Jamestown, 100 miles off, with spring wheat and cattle prices quoted between innings.  Falling asleep to night games on the coast against the Angels, when the CCO feed would sometimes come fading in, and you could actually listen to the pregame show, which wasn’t on the local broadcast.  Remembering each and every trip to the Promised Land-- Met Stadium—where the sun just shown more brightly on those acres of green grass, and Carew and Killer and Tony O would be live and in the flesh. 

 

For a time, I lived in DC, pre-Nats, so had to make the trek to Memorial Stadium for the O’s, which was actually kind of a treat.  One night, a few of us ND boys, working on Congressional staffs, went to Yanks game, and pretended to be obnoxious jagoffs from the Bronx.  A few years in the Cities themselves, including ’87, where I went to 20-some games, and was lucky enough to see them lose only a couple of times!  Just picked the right ones, I guess.  Then on to Chicago, a 5-minute walk from Wrigley for many years.  I could hear Harry singing from my back porch, for better or worse.  I like to think it was better…  Catching the Twinkies every time they played on the South Side, in that brand-spanking-new, ugly-as-hell stadium, which faced AWAY from the beautiful Chicago skyline.  And sitting right behind the dugout most late innings, since the Sox fans didn’t care to come in any numbers. One night, watched LaTroy stand up and give it to a Sox fan who was ragging on the rookie outfielder who spelled his name with two ii’s.

 

Then on to LA, where I could ride my cycle about 10 minutes, park in a little neighborhood, and scamper up the hillside on a secret path, to avoid the hellscape parking lot of Dodger stadium, and of course, go down to the OC, and see the Twinkies whack the Angels around- except in the one series where it really counted…

 

Now, I’m farther away than ever before.  It’s a long and twisted tale how I got to Hong Kong, of all places.  Suffice it to say, I’m in my own sort of Foreign Legion. There is some baseball here, but it’s played in secret.  There used to be one batting cage in town, but it closed down.  Kept playing in a fantasy league with my old mates from teaching school in LA for a few years, to keep in touch with it all.  Keeping up with the home team, I stumbled across TwinkieTown first, and was overjoyed for the outlet to converse about all things Twins.  Followed some link one time, and then… then…  I found this place.

 

It’s been a tumbleweed existence these past several years.  Rootless, rounded by the winds and hard contact with the ground.  The first couple of years in mainland China, getting stark reminders of how Big Brother got his foot on every neck—another tale for another time.  Even so, what a treat it was to share the English office at my first school sandwiched between a cricket-loving Aussie, and a pair of Oxford boys- 1 from the UK one, the other from the Mississippi one-  It was a non-stop Monty Python sketch on any given day.  After segueing to Hong Kong, and re-igniting my rugby career (an monumentally bad idea physically, but highly recommended socially), and picking up with a gang of Kiwis, Welshmen, Scots, Froggies, yeh, some English, and a passel of local lads, the Language of the Queen I never heard mangled in so many ways before, nor epithets uttered more colorfully.

 

But still, homesickness and dark clouds set in.  Close to good friends, but farther and farther from home.  Enter the magical world of T-Daily.  At once, the banter, the snark, the esoteric discussion of The Lord’s Game washed over me like a warm ocean wave-  I had a connection home.  A return to those times of night games on the coast, with folks who understood what it meant to be bleary-eyed at school the next day.  Sneaking that ear bud to the transistor radio in your school desk- like the teacher never knew…. 

 

A collection of folks from all walks and stages of life, crusty old vets, and even crustier millenials, doctors, lawyers, chiefs, and such.  Sharp wit and milk-out-nose-inducing gifs, the pathos of bitter losses shared, and the chicken dinners that always just taste better in a family kind of setting.  And all there, to bring me back home—

 

But it’s been so much more than that, especially lately.  If I offend some sensibilities out there, so be it- but the runup to this past year, the divisiveness and mean-spirited nature of so much of the present discourse has cast such a pall in my world.  As a Yank offshore, I’ve got the outside perspective on goings-on at home, and have endured unending queries of whether our whole nation is just out of our collective minds right now.  The sheer sadness it’s engendered in my very soul has made for a lot of dark days.  Couple that with the mind-boggling sociopathy of young men who, on a regular basis, feel it necessary to kill masses of innocents to get their twisted version of the world across, and make themselves feel like they belong to something larger.  It’s tough some days not to wallow in despair.  I used to devour several newspapers nearly every day, go to sleep with the BBC on at night, but not anymore.  Most days I just hide from it. 

 

And here, then, is my refuge.  Sometimes it’s here that I get out of the shell and the darkness, and realize there are folks who keep a fire going on the hearth.  It’s almost a lifeline sometimes.  Kevin Costner’s Ness character in The Untouchables has a moment where he gets a note from his wife on the eve of a dangerous bust, and remarks, “In some part of the world, someone still cares what color the kitchen is.”  And that’s what brings me back from the doldrums, sometimes.  That somewhere in the world, somebody cares about how that breaking ball is biting, or how mucked up the lineup is that day.  And I can lose myself, and regenerate, and take positive energy even from days like unbelievable BP meltdowns. 

 

So, here’s to Why 2K.  And here’s to those who grace these pages in cyberland, who may not know what it might mean to some random Joe far away, who can blow a snot bubble at a comment, and carry a good feeling that day. 

 

So, thanks, y’all.  Looking forward to a few K more.

(And for the BP, a few more K’s).

 

I’ll close with some words from Whitman, that seem to mean a lot these days:
http://www.bartleby.com/142/27.html

 

[DocBauer]

Outstanding post!

 

As someone who has not lived your life from a geographical point of view, to be sure, I can still relate whole heartedly! As I have stated previously, I've been a Twins fan since I was 5yo. (I'm 51 now). I have lived my entire life in South Dakota and Nebraska. I have listened to static filled late night airwaves from 57.0 WNAX from Yankton, SD my entire life before internet games. (Still do, however). And in my youth I poured over the Star Tribune when I could get hold of copies, Basball Digest, The Sporting News, Baseball America, a short lived Twins paper in the late 80's, and drank in every paper report my eyes could consume until the internet became such a part of my world.

 

My father is 73, a frequent reader of TD and my posts as well as everyone else's. He taught me the game I love, but never played, and has joined me in regard to the consuming of paper rags and radio broadcasts. A running joke in the family was always to simply leave the room and just let us be when we got to talking about the Twins. Lol And to this day we spend hours a week discussing our beloved Twins, listen and watch games together whenever possible.

 

Much like the speech given from James Earl Jones near the end of Field Of Dreams, through the various rise and fall of our own lives, there has always been baseball. And with no details...(there but the grace of God go I after all)...2016 was the absolute, most difficult year of my life. The echoes of 2016 still carry over to 2017 with the hopes of a better tomorrow. And it's not merely symbolism or hyperbole to compare the Twins, despite it being an entertainment venue, and their 2016 and 2017 to my own experiences. Despite my own trials of last season, and that of the Twins, there was always baseball. Always conversations my father. Always debate and discussion and wonder at today and tomorrow, and always baseball.

 

As silly as it may sound, TD is like a beautiful rest stop, or weigh station, in my own life as I journey forth...just as the Twins do. There is always tomorrow, and another game. At TD I am roused to intellectual stimulus, befuddlement and humor. Sometimes within the same thread! It is a disjointed, somewhat obscure and extended community that borders on family with a love and passion that binds all together.

 

None of us knows what tomorrow will bring to us in our daily lives. But tomorrow will always come, with its tireless ebbs and flows. But it will come.

 

And there will always be baseball.

[Mike Sixel]

As someone that just moved across the US, and knows no one really, this is my place to hang out with "friends".

 

That was a great post.