Ecstasy can quickly turn to grief even as you celebrate the rites of spring. On Monday, the beautiful weather and feelings of opening day anticipation at Angel Stadium had me all aglow with joy. I even opined about it here in my last post.
Then, gone, shattered, all feelings of innocence destroyed…maybe forever.
The third day of the season, a young pitcher struggling to make the Los Angeles Angels’ roster pitches like a bulldog for six straight innings, holding the hated opponent to zero runs. After the game, he tells everyone that he finally feels like he’s a major leaguer.
Then, early the next morning after celebrating with friends, that same pitcher is slain by a vehicle speeding through a red light, the driver drunk, driving with a suspended license from a previous DUI. Two of the pitcher’s friends die, a fourth clings for his life in a hospital.
His parents, at least one of whom–his father–attended the game, lose their only child. A cold ring from the phone awakens the family to the most horrible news in the world–a child has been taken before them.
Baseball is no longer the innocent sport of summer. Nick Adenhart is gone, and here just hours before he pitched, I was predicting "the bum" wouldn’t last two innings.
It’s so easy to have opinions in baseball. Opinions are hard to shatter when there’s no wake-up call, but once a loving, proud family is shattered through a terrible tragedy, baseball fades into the dark shadows of reality. The warm glow of opening day is now but a nightmarish eclipse.
Can we fans ever recover? Ever attend a game with youthful abandon, gorging ourselves on hot dogs and beer, and thinking, "At last, spring is here and we are renewed"
With time, probably. Time, they say, heals all wounds, but even when wounds heal, often there are scars.
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Posted in Almanack Musings |
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