We lost but I won

As I have moved through life I have come to appreciate that there are languages and methods of communicating that are truly universal. Things like how to coo to a child of any nationality, play with a dog, and the like. Others I have found are music, medicine, futbal, and now baseball.

I mentioned in a previous post that I met a couple of Kazakh guys here who want to resurrect Little League. We met at a local ex-pat coffee shop (their idea, not mine) and as we were leaving they asked if I would like to play Sunday, today. I thought how cool that would be to play baseball and get to know yet another group of folks here. That and I have committed to helping them bring Little League to the kids here who need mentors. But I digress.

There is just one ball field here in town, the former field used for all Little League games. Let me try to describe it for you. Did you ever play on a dirt field, with lumps and rocks, where bases were trees, and where there were no fences? Hold that picture in your mind's eye and add this. The field was covered with rocks, bottles, broken glass, dog shit, and the odd condom. No grass but lots of tall weeds which helped if you were in the outfield and were trying to run down a grounder that escaped from the inflield.The dug outs are from whence came the condoms and where one can find the Kazakh equivalent of Boone's Farm's finest. Butts were all around. The chain link fences had huge holes in them. There were so many acorns on ground that it was like running on ball bearings.

The foul lines were marked with red socks tied onto the fence and because the sides of the field were so ratty we played with two bases. Slow pitch except when it took too long in which case it became faster pitch. "Home runs are outs" meaning that if you hit the ball over the fence, or it went through a hole, you were out because it was a major pain to climb and get the ball. All the while being carefull not have you own ripped off by the junk yard dogs that were guarding something or other. In short is was baseball heaven.

We chose up teams. I played first base, actually second base with a left shifted infield as we only had four to six players per side, depending on who was too drunk, hung over, was smoking a cigarette or a doobie, or just wanted to watch. Oh, the coolest part, we were as follows: five Kazakhs, three Koreans, three Cubans, and me, an aging American. I told Lynne I was going to play and she gave me a short just barely perceptible eye roll. Something about how I don't seem to know my limitations. I called her this evening and the first question she asked, even before the "Hi Honey" was did I have all my parts and were they still working. 

Other ground rules, three strikes, no balls. Shut up and I'll pitch as I damn well please (slow or fast, or....) and tell Mike to wipe his damn shoe. Mine seemed to hunt all the dog shit and lets leave it at that. Some guys couldn't hit, some couldn't field, and one Korean played professional ball just last year! All the Koreans had on full uniforms except one didn't have a mitt. One the other end of the clothing spectrum was yours truly in shorts, hiking shoes (whoda thunk baseball when packing) and a tee shirt (gray of course). Two of the Koreans excused themselves and said they would be back in half an hour. Timur, the Little League guru, looked at me with a grin and said, "that's an hour and a half in Kazakhstan." Sure enough right on Kazakh cue they reappeared, one a sheet or two to the wind and the other doing the "tobacco" thing. 

Kids from the neighborhood came and shagged some of the foul balls and sat on top of the dugout. They of course were informed about the hopeful happenings Little League wise.

So I'm home, a touch sore but intact. Don't know the score and don't care. I do know I'll be back next Sunday, limitations be damned.