WARNING! the photo below may burn your eyes

Last week I had lunch with my mom, my aunt and my aunt's friend. My aunt produced a photo that my cousin had found at her house not too long ago. The photo was taken at the Charleston airport in August 1987 on the day that I left to be an exchange student in Australia. The photo obviously dates me. Don't laugh - I don't need you to tell me I had the big, bad perm that a lot of people were sporting in small-town USA in the 80s. Trust me: I know now that it looked awful. (my cousin Brad, me, Jimmy, Stephen, Todd, and Dara)

Anyway, I showed the picture to Mac yesterday and asked him if he recognized anybody in the photo. He had no idea. (He shouldn't feel bad, I guess, because my own mother insisted that could not be me in the photo.) When I told him that was me in the front, he laughed and told me I looked ridiculous. He told me my hair looked awful and asked if this picture was taken in the 60s. I should put him on talking restriction.

Then I pointed out Jimmy in the photo, who, let's admit, looks a little ridiculous too, right? Mac continues to suffer from hero worship for his father and he loved everything about Jimmy in the photo. He loved how long Jimmy's legs looked, he commented favorably on those plaid shorts, he thought the long hair was cool. You get the picture.

I asked him if he recognized anybody else and he immediately pointed out Jimmy's oldest and dearest friend Stephen, which obviously validates Stephen being named "Least Changed" at our 20th class reunion last summer.

Stephen might be thankful for the "Least Changed" vote, but I, for one, will gladly go for "Most Changed" if the look in this photo is what I'm getting away from!

baseball has consumed my life

As you know, Mac had his first game on Saturday. Late on Saturday night, I received an email with the season's schedule that showed the first game was Monday. Did they realize that was only two days away? Did they not know that I like the Upward format of one practice a week with one game a week? And each needs to last only one hour? Somebody obviously didn't get my memo.

So I washed the uniform and we got to the field at 5:30pm for warmups before the 6pm game. And wouldn't you know that our opponents were that same pesky orange team from Saturday. You know, the team that's one step away from being drafted for the Minor Leagues? Yeah, they were our opponents again.

And they played as well last night as they played Saturday. Somebody told me last night that this team has played together for two seasons and the coaches requested that they receive the same players this season. Are all the other teams formed the same way? Are we going to be the David in a David vs. Goliath battle two times a week?

For me, the important thing was that Mac had a great time. He didn't have as great a game technically as he did on Saturday, but he had fun. But apparently fun doesn't count for much in Little League. At the end of the game, which our team lost handily, the fill-in coach (because we still have yet to lay eyes on our coach!) told the team not to be discouraged because they played well "for a team that hadn't had any practices." Helloooooo? Did he have to qualify under what circumstances they played well?

Apparently so. And apparently we are no longer going to be able to use that qualification after Saturday's game because we are now having practice tonight, Wednesday, and Thursday nights. Our coach is MIA - he coaches three ice hockey teams that have been playing in a tournament in Nashville and he only supposedly got back to town late last night. We have two very proactive team moms and it's only because of them, that we even knew we had a game last night. They talked to the league president last night who took pity on our team and gave us a field to practice on for the next.three.nights. Oh, how I love being pitied. NOT.

I knew that one day our lives were going to be dominated by sports schedules. But I have to admit that I didn't think that it would be now. Five nights out of seven for one sport for one child? Are you kidding me? I am going to become one of those mothers who knows the name of the kid working at the drive-thru at McDonald's because we see him every night. If you're on our Christmas list, you should be prepared to receive Happy Meal toys from us because we should amass the entire spring and summer collection before this baseball season is over.

So we return to the field tonight. Hopefull to meet our elusive coach who maybe will show up tonight now that we've got 2 games under our belts?

I wonder how they'll qualify the team's playing on Saturday if, after three practices, there's no improvement? If you're in Summerville and have time to kill, won't you stop by the Little League fields and keep me company?

what a fun weekend

1. "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" movie on opening day. With his best friend. Followed by dinner with best friend's family. Does it get any better than that for a 7 year-old?

2. Opening Day of baseball. Wait, the weekend's getting better for aforementioned 7 year-old.

3. Aforementioned best friend's birthday party. Weekend is officially off-the-charts excellent for 7 year-old.

4. Dinner with school friend and her family followed by cul-de-sac baseball with family (friend's dad played minor league baseball in Central America which impresses a 7 year-old nearly as much as if he'd said he was a Jedi Knight) and neighborhood kids. 7 year-old could die happy right now.

5. Another birthday party for the world's most adorable 2 year-old (full disclosure: she is my cousin's daughter so she is related but she honestly looks like the Gerber baby, only cuter). More cake and ice cream for 7 year-old who thinks he must have died and gone to heaven.

The saying goes that "when Moma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy." Well let me tell you that when the 7 year-old's happy, Moma can't help but be happy. Hope your weekend was "off-the-charts excellent", too.

"put me in coach. I'm ready to play"

Today was Opening Day for Summerville Little League. I thought Opening Day would mean they'd introduce the teams, somebody would sing the National Anthem off-key, we'd eat a hot dog and that would be it. But earlier in the week, I learned an actual game was involved. (They limited the season opener game to one hour apiece, but it was a game for the records nonetheless.)

Now you might be thinking that of course, they'd play on Opening Day. After all, that's what they've been practicing for, right?

Except that they only had 2 practices ahead of time. One practice was only attended by 3 players (one of whom was Mac). And the coach is out of town this week, so we haven't even met him. He wasn't even here for Opening Day.

If you understand what I'm saying, there was a lot of room for error. I mean, A MONUMENTAL LOT.The coach emailed everybody and told them to wear gray baseball pants and the team's red jersey. But there was no mention of matching belts and socks, so of course I cheaped out and bought white baseball socks at Wal-Mart to go with the cheap cleats I bought at Wal-Mart. (After all, we'll be lucky if he doesn't outgrow them before the season ends.)

I knew we needed a belt but I didn't have time to go to the sporting goods store before today, so after checking Wal-Mart (no baseball belts) and Target (no baseball belts), I decided to improvise and I just bought a belt in the boys' section of Target that sort of looked like a baseball belt and definitely could pass from a long distance for a baseball belt, but which was most definitely not a baseball belt. Thank goodness Jimmy wasn't here to witness this and Mac is too young to know better.

So Mac was fairly well-dressed for the part. And as we all know, he's a sucker for any activity that gets him a new uniform so he's loving the whole get-up.
Anyway, we show up and our team looks like we just got off the Island of Misfits. Every single person on the other team had their orange shirts, gray pants, orange socks and orange belts. They probably all had on matching orange underwear, too. Our team didn't even all have on gray baseball pants. Heck, not everybody on our team even had baseball pants on. But it wasn't a fashion show, right?

Our boys took the field first. Mac was in centerfield and was able to stop several hard hits (over the course of a couple innings). The other team clearly has been practicing batting for at least the last two months or else they are genetically predisposed to being Louisville Sluggers. It had the distinct feel and flavor of a David vs. Goliath situation.

When we finally got our first turn at batting, there was so little hitting that it was embarrassing. I mean really embarrasssing. In coach pitch, each batter gets 5 overhand pitches and if he doesn't hit any of them, he gets two soft pitches. If those aren't hit, he's out. (In the interest of time today - with the one-hour time limit on each game - they only did the first 5 pitches.) We may have seen 3 up, 3 down straight out of the box. It was pretty demoralizing as a parent who wants her son's team to do well.

The orange team's next at-bat was a repeat of the first. They hit hard, ran fast and didn't get any quick outs. But then something happened to our team at their next at-bat. They actually hit the ball and got on base. Spirits picked up and it really became a fun ballgame to watch because it wasn't so lopsided.

And Mac played his heart out. He had two opportunities to bat. He got out at first on the first bat (after a great hit) and made it safely to first on his second at-bat. He moved from centerfield to the pitcher position (it's coach pitch, so he didn't pitch but he played the position). And he assisted in the last out of the game by getting the ball and throwing it right to the first baseman. It was a great first game for him and he was thrilled with the whole thing.

There's always some little fly in the ointment in even the best situations and today was no different. There are definitely a couple parents on this team that are going to grate on my nerves before this is over. They clearly should have enrolled their sons in the Parks league, which is reportedly the more competitive league in town. Nothing suited them today: they're upset the coach wasn't there, they're upset that they only had 1 practice (they weren't among the 3 boys who showed up for the first practice) when some teams have been practicing for weeks; they're upset that the stand-in coach couldn't pitch better; they're upset that nobody taught the children every single baseball rule in the one hour of practice they had this week. The lady corrected everything her son did wrong, almost before he had a chance to make a "mistake." I intentionally tried to bother her by using my Upward training in applauding players from both teams on good plays, but I think it was lost on her. What I really wanted to do was tell her that these children are 7 years old and that they just need to be having fun and breathing fresh air and getting dirty, but she was sort of scary and I didn't think she'd take well to my advice. I saw her in a nurse's uniform the other day, so I'm hoping she's going to be working a lot of shifts when we have games so she can't rain on our parade.

All in all, a GREAT first day of baseball. I can't wait for Jimmy to get here next week to participate.

(And if they give an award to worst-dressed player, it won't go to Mac. We bought the red socks and belt after the game today!)

the blessings and beauty of a really great best friend

As you know, Caroline and her fabulous almost-my-cousin husband, Willie, invited Mac and me over for an anniversary celebration last Sunday (on the actual occasion of our 12th wedding anniversary). And of course, Mac got vomititis, as Willie called it, and we had to postpone until today.

Caroline and Willie are hosting a garden wedding at their beautiful marshfront home next weekend and they've worked like dogs the last couple weekends to get the yard in pristine condition. Did that stop them from being gracious enough to have us over last weekend and then rescheduling for this weekend? They put out 45 bales of pinestraw yesterday and today still cooked these delicious stuffed mushrooms, followed by homemade bleu cheese and walnut ravioli, lobster tails and asparagus. And that was just the prelude to this divine chocolate cake and ice cream that probably had more goodness stuffed in it than anything I ate from Tuesday to Friday combined of this week. They should have been in the bed today with the heating pad on their backs but they did all that for us.

Caroline has never forgotten one single anniversary of the last twelve. She's remembered every milestone of my life since we graduated from college and she's never forgotten Jimmy's birthday since we were married. She has sent goodie boxes to us from near and far; we even got bagels from New York City when we lived in Mozambique.

This friendship isn't about the bagels or the birthday presents. It's about the remembering and the celebrating of life. Caroline has seen the good, the bad and the ugly in me, and she still loves me and celebrates me. She knows, like I do, that marriage isn't always pretty or easy, but it's certainly worth the trouble and celebration with the right man. She has, like I do, a hard-fought-for only child that's precious and perfect and worth a hundred children to someone else. We share a lot of familial struggles that a lot of people don't have or don't understand.

Most importantly, we share the gift of time and history. I have been blessed by a lot of great friends who make a lasting mark on my life, but who, sadly, enter and exit my life within a two-year period. I hope that with luck I'll see those people again at some point in the future, but there are no guarantees.

Caroline's not like one of those friends. She'll be there. Luck or not. It'll happen. Why? Because she's more than a great friend. She's a best friend, no matter the time or distance that separates us.

So Caroline, here's to you and the beautiful and generous gift of your friendship. Thank you for making my anniversary special this year and every other year! I am a better person because of the light you, Willie and Isabel bring into my life.

Jersey Mike and me

Today I had to run to Charleston and knew I'd be back in Summerville by lunch time. My appetite is back in full swing, so I weighed my options on the 30-minute ride and decided I'd really like a good sub. I have had subs on the brain since I saw the guy eat a Subway Veggie Delite on The Biggest Loser the other night.

I should have just gone to get the Veggie Delite - after all, Jillian said it met the caloric and fat content of The Biggest Loser contestants, so surely it fits my caloric and fat requirements.

But I decided to go to Jersey Mike's instead. Big mistake for somebody who might want, I don't know, some vegetables maybe on the sandwich?

Their veggie sandwich has provolone, swiss and green peppers.

No, I am not kidding.

Guess how many thin little green pepper rings they put on a 6-inch sub? TWO.

Now, I am not kidding again.

When I saw two pepper rings laying on 6 slices of cheese, I told the guy he had to be kidding me. This was a veggie sub and he put 2 pepper rings on it?

He told me that was how they made veggie subs, but I could certainly have more if I wanted. I said I did, and he put two more thin rings on. Whoa. He really splashed out. He said not everybody liked green peppers. To which I asked why would anybody order a veggie sub that lists 3 ingredients, with only one being an actual vegetable if they don't like the vegetable that's listed? Wouldn't they just order a cheese sub?

And while Subway has cucumbers and olives and all these other yummy, healthy things to put on the sub, Jersey Mike's has lettuce, tomatoes, and onions.

Big disappointment.

Plus Subway has way better bread choices.

So after this failed lunch experiment, I will remain a Subway gal from now on. Jersey Mike is now a distant memory; I'm sticking with Jared and Jillian.

baseball is just around the corner

Yesterday I got a call from Mac's baseball coach. He only wanted my email address so he could send out an email to everybody when the practice schedule is released. I gave him my email and asked him to confirm that there would be one, maybe two, practices per week.

If I had obligated myself to be a coach, I would know how many nights a week I was committed.

But the coach said he had no idea.

This leads me to believe that either a) the coach has nothing else going on in his life so it really doesn't matter if baseball takes up one or seven nights; or b) it doesn't matter how many nights he has to coach because his child's future as a professional baseball player starts NOW.

Either choice is scary to me, but I'm inclined to believe that here in Summerville, SC, we might be leaning to choice "b".