My policy this year in the Great Baseball Project has been to have each game’s post written and published before the next game starts. For the most part I have managed to keep that appointment with myself; occasionally I have written but not published, but I have always, I think, done fair service to the experience. This time, however, I have fallen down on the job. Even though I had well over a week to get the final Reds game of the series and the year written up, I had a lot else on my plate and I kept putting it off and putting it off, and the net result was that not only did I not get it written, but I also forgot a lot of what happened. In my defense, I spent almost all of that week moving everything I own from one place to another, and I was pretty happy with the fact that I made it to all the games, not to mention writing them up, but I let the last one slip away.
My guest was Raven, partner of Karyn and one of my perennials – she’s been to a game with me nearly every year since I got the tickets. We’ve been friends for a long time, and we always have a lot to talk about, so one of my notes for the game makes sense: “the kind of conversation in which the person in front of you learns everything about you.” I remember that in this case, that included information about the parents we lost during the pandemic, some of the people we dated, some of the parties we went to, and some of the social groups we belong to, and we are not quiet people, so I got the impression more than once that the people sitting near us were marveling at the amount of detail revealed. The rest of my notes are less clear, although “rally nope” leads me to believe we might have felt there was a chance for the Giants to win this game at some point. The final score was 4-1 Cincinnati, though, so the nope part seems like it was more relevant than the rally part.
As I watch the MLB.tv archive of the game, I am reminded of two things – one, that before the game there was a naturalization ceremony before the game, in which a judge swore in fifty candidates from twenty-seven countries as citizens of the United States, which was frankly breathtaking. It was, at the time, just a great spectacle – people waving the flag of their new country, hands over their hearts, some very emotional; it didn’t make me think of privilege or my own situation while I was watching them on the field, but thinking of it in retrospect is making me think a lot about how fortunate I am. I was involved once, in a hot tub with a bunch of other white people, in a conversation about “first world problems,” and I listened to everyone else’s – no cooking facilities, unreliable wifi – and commented that those were actually third world problems, and someone said something like “Oh, yeah, well, what’s your first world problem?” and I said “It’s exhausting trying to find someone to go to every Giants game on my free tickets,” and pretty much everyone had to agree that that was definitely a first world problem.
The other thing I remember is that although the temperature was announced at game time as 73°, it felt like it was closer to about 90. I was once offered the chance to sit in Larry Baer’s seats next to the Giants dugout for a game; aside from that this was the first time I have ever opted for anything besides Section 152, Row 3, Seats 5 and 6; Raven and I sat in seats 11 and 12 instead, because they were in the shade. Even so, it was a sweaty day – the game-time temperature was later corrected to 77°, but that still feels inadequate to describe the heat. It was, however, a beautiful day for a ballgame.
I have started taking enough photos to document the games, and looking back at the pictures reminds me that we also had visitors, who found us in spite of the fact that we were not in my usual seats; two Stoeckleins – longstanding friends-of-the-family – sought me out and chatted for a while; they’re veteran Giants fans and come from Sacramento to a few games every year, and I extracted a promise from one of them, who is moving to SF this month, to take one of my remaining tickets. (in spite of my first world problem, I have September almost completely booked).
What Did You Think of the Afternoon, Raven?
(I forgot to ask Raven to send me a paragraph on what she thought of the game, and now that it’s a week and a half later, I’m not going to ask her to try to remember. I assume she had a good time, because she keeps coming back.)
81 Dates 