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LEARN HOW TO MAKE OUR TYPE LARGER

	Just a thought
	Betty Lammers

Batter up
Published July/August 2000

Baseball season is here! Two of my six-year old granddaughters are starting T-Ball. We didn’t have that much organization when I grew up. Boys played baseball and girls jumped rope and bounced balls singing songs like “B my name is Betty, I come from Baltimore and I sell bananas.” My own daughters enjoyed being on a recreational team playing softball and my son was a coach. My husband and I (in our sixties) went to watch the games. One particular, night two of the players were late because of work and the team would have to forfeit the game if they didn’t arrive soon.

I watched them approach me pleading, “Please, Mom, we need another player.” I assured them I couldn’t play. The only time I had tried was on a mountain vacation when it was all in fun. At that game, when I got up to bat the outfield sat down to rest and one prankster picked up first base and moved it halfway to home plate. Funny.

“All you have to do is put on this red shirt and stand out in right field. Nobody ever hits there.” Another player assured me that anything hit into that area, she would get. What was a mother to do? I shirted up and went out. Nothing came in my direction and I breathed a sigh of relief and went into the dugout – relaxed – until I heard, “OK, mom, you’re up.” “You mean I have to bat?” It seems the rules were that I had to play three innings to make it official. Ugh.

Well, I got up to bat and got an RBI. Not that I hit anything, but I walked someone home and everyone seemed elated. Afterward, the pitcher of the opposing team was heard to say, “I didn’t know how to pitch to her, she was standing in such a weird position.”

Although the team thought of me as a “good sport,” that was the end of my athletic career.

E-mail Betty Lammers at betty@homefrontmagazine.com.

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