Swing away!

"Remember kid, there's heroes and there's legends. Heroes get remembered but legends never die, follow your heart kid, and you'll never go wrong"
The Babe- from the movie, The Sandlot

In the neighborhood we lived where our two story six bedroom home was located was perfect for us kids to congregate. Directly in front of our home was a cul-de-sac and one house away was a second court. This provided two open asphalt playgrounds where we could spread out and play. These were the training grounds for bicycle riding, roller skating, lighting fireworks, and most importantly playing baseball.

I had a motley crew of friends in this neighborhood of different backgrounds and it also became a central hub of surrounding neighborhoods. We could easily put together teams of six and form a football or baseball game in no time at all. Nextdoor I had my friend Tod who was a year older than I and on the other side I had my friend Kevin a year younger. Across in the court I had a two more friends and the house behind ours lived a large mormon family. My fishing buddy Tim lived a few doors down and my friend Dean and his brother Steven lived in the second court. Jeff, Rick, Jim, Dennis, Joey D, Fred and a few others came from adjacent streets.

One of our favorite team sports was baseball and to reduce the number of damage to the houses around us we used a tennis ball instead of a hardball. The hardball came out at times when we didn't have a tennis ball, but we all knew that a broken window would stop us from playing there, at least temporarily.

On one hot summer day we gathered up our leather gloves and bats and picked teams. Summers in the small hick town of Livermore often brought triple digit temperatures and so we played our games earlier in the day to be followed by swimming in Kevin's pool. Afterward and the we would go to Dean's house and consume large bowls of ice cream. He always had ice cream in his house. Life was grand!

After we picked teams we would flip a coin to see who batted first. Everyone wanted to bat and I particularly liked a small wooden bat that I could rip with. If one really got a hold of a ball it would go the entire distance of the court and hit the roof on a house across the street. Home run!

On this day I was in the outfield which placed me I the middle of the street. If a car came down one of us would yell, "Car!" and the game would quickly come to a halt. Kevin came to bat so I knew I had to be ready. He always got a piece of the ball so I knew I had to be alert.

After a few pitches Kevin swung and hit a high fly ball in my general direction so I bolted towards it as fast as my feet would carry me. It was a foul ball and curved towards Tod's house. As I approached the sidewalk at full speed I tripped over a dangling piece of leather on my worn out shoe and fell headfirst. As I braced for impact with my right hand outstretched it snapped loudly and the next part of my body that hit was my face onto the curb. Breaking my glasses and knocking out my front teeth I wailed loudly on Tod's lawn. My friends didn't see me land and were all laughing not knowing what happened until Dean showed up.

Immediately Dean seeing the disaster sprinted to my house and banged on the front door furiously summoning my father. As my Pop approached and saw me lying there in a pool of blood he said, "Your teeth!" My mouth didn't hurt as much as my broken wrist, but I'm sure my Pop knew that teeth were a bigger more costly concern for a family our size. When I opened my mouth the air hit the exposed nerves in my crushed incisors and I let out a shriek. Oh man! I was in deep trouble!

This moment of our personal history that we shared as a group of childhood friends is forever imbedded in our minds. Today we can still recall the events in detail. From the shout, "Swing away!" to the my lifeless body drenched in blood on Tod's lawn. It was the first time one of us would be injured badly. It served as a reminder of our frailty, but more importantly it was a glue that cemented our friendships. Moments of pain can change how you see the world and our vision in these innocent times. Our teacher was the hot pavement and this school of hard knocks was precursor of many of life's curveballs we would have to endure in the future.