Softball: Another Deep Dive into Ascription of Blame in Times of Peril

[raymond...@gmail.com]

Dear People, 

 

In one of those rare drama-drenched masterpieces in which our individual player experiences ricocheted between the hope for civilizational renewal and the metaphorical despair of species-wide collapse, my team took on Jimmy McGuire’s with resolve, aplomb, and subtle hints of tarragon. Yeah, there was, for example, the peerlessly acrobatic Kyla Brown, who free-soloed up and over the tall left field fence to retrieve a wayward 4th-inning foul with the same fearless dexterity that her son Levi had exhibited just a week earlier over the home plate backstop (and to think that some still say genetics is BS!). And there was also the fantabulous Angela Noury, whose 6th-inning snag of Chris Fure’s blistering bullet to 3rd melded the very best of email-organized sport, Newtonian physics, and the ever-impressive human eyeball. To be sure, so much excellence to savor.

 

Of course, there was also the gnawing ontological slide into sorrow and gloom. For example, the usually imperturbable Mark Laber was self-sidelined in the 3rd just because a bunch of overpaid material scientists can’t produce a titanium hip that works seamlessly and pain-free a full month after surgery! And let’s not forget my own epic fails which continued from the previous week, with yet another bases-loaded pop up that seemed to trigger ubiquitous yearnings among my own peeps for a well-justified putsch. To be sure, so much for which to atone. 

 

And, in some, the entire gamut of the kinesio-emotive experience played out in a single deeply complex athlete qua athlete. I think most obviously of the legendary Bobby Fulgham, a hurler extraordinaire by both birth and temperament, who nevertheless still unleashed a 4th-inning 2-RBI 4-bagger directly over Chris’ discombobulated little head in deep sharp left, for with that single feat outside the expectative box, Jim’s team took a dominating one-run lead that they held until two outs and one on in the bottom of the 9th!

 

Alas, though, as Bobby closed in on his final game-winning pitch, he clearly became ‘distracted’ by the fact that his cherished American Bullmastif mix, the utterly gorgeous Huxley Fulgham, had just chewed through his all-rubber leash, and thus there was now a risk of a mad dash for Emeryville. Yeah, to say that fate turns on the random externalities of life’s rich pageant is to barely touch the epistemological surface, and yet here we are—micro-observational, macro-contemplative, and utterly mystified by the inexplicable and supposedly predetermined gestalt.

 

The point is that when Bobby let loose his deeply resented 2-fingered lung-butter ball against Michael Hersh with the score tied, two out, and the winning run at 3rd, he apparently forgot to notice if his defense was aware of the imminence of the first pitch at hand. Alas, they weren’t, and as Mikie’s searing hopper darted past an oblivious Jim at short and two more fielders beyond, deep consternation abounded as Professor McFocusnot’s peeps went down, and down hard, 15-14. 

 

Now look, I get that it would be easy for his contingent to blame a premature sinker for the calamity at hand, but I also think that in this cynical age where everyone from migrants to journalists to Nickleback are shamelessly scapegoated for the ills of our lives, we as a truth-seeking league must look deeper and wider, and if that means that Bobby, Jim, and Huxley have a lot to consider in the guilt-ridden decades to come, so be it. And therefore there will be a game at Bushrod this Sunday at 11, IF I get enough commits by this Friday morning . . . Raymond