7/31/02
Softball: Clipped (Another Hero for Tomorrow’s Youth)
Dear People,
Congratz to all on last week’s lush 24-21 paragon of life’s majestic pageant. For the record, it was my team that stranded the tying run at home in the bottom of the 9th, and on any normal day, that fact alone would have rendered me a sullen and drooling mess on the streets of El Cerrito. However, I was able to transcend my despair, for there were events at this game that soon made me realize that our community was now steadily becoming an institution of eternal and intergenerational significance, with as much social continuity as General Electric, Harvard University or Duran Duran.
These revelations came to me in the top of the 5th, when Don blasted what I believe is the longest and most stunning left-field homer in the history of our league, landing as it did in the distant bush where many a Yak have been known to rut. In all candor, I first suspected either steroids or quaaludes, but just a few minutes later I found myself looking into the piercing eyes of his beloved two-week-old son, Diego. This precious suckling was clearly the inspirational juice for what had just transpired, and moreover, whenever I looked back into those magnificent baby corneas, I saw an unyielding determination to drive that ball harder, further and with more Euclidean efficiency than Pops could ever dream of.
Still, not all of us will be giving of our seed. In fact, a bit later I happened to be talking to Stephan the Dunkleator about our respective fear of breeding, and it was at that point that he delicately told me that he would be soon be undergoing my all-time favorite medical procedure. Naturally, I was elated, especially when he and Deb said that I was welcome to announce this news to all of you, so long as I assured him the basic dignity that is befitting a person whose tiny little testicular tubing is about to be decimated.
As you can imagine, I am delighted that another softball-playing colleague will be joining me in CAVJA (The California Association of Vasectomized Jewish Athletes---check us out at CAVJA.org!). Oh sure, I don’t even know if Steph’s technically Hebraic, but it’s not like were an exclusionist organization. In any case, his journey to the barren forest may be taking place as you read these very words, and yet he has assured me that he will be out there for our very next game---hitting, running and sliding if necessary!
Of course, I’m not sure that’s such a great idea, especially given that four days into my own experience, my scrotum still felt as if it were being weighted down by a 60 pound bowling ball. Yet even if the Vazman needs a pinch runner, Diego and his peers will one day look back at this towering symbol of aerobic sterility, and at the very least, pay homage to the starkly vital confluence of sport, ice and really tight-fitting all-cotton briefs. And therefore, there will be a game at Codornices this Sunday at 11, IF I get enough commits by this Friday noon…Raymond
8/2/02
Softball: Resilience
Dear People,
There will be a game at Codornices this Sunday at 11, and as of now, there are still FOUR slots left. And yes, the first post-snip reports are that the Dunkleator will be out there playing in all his seedless glory, which as far as I’m concerned is nothing less than scrotal evidence of a higher Being.
Please bring $2 for the field, which for this week only includes a complimentary carafe of fresh chocolate goat milk….Raymond 845-7552
BACK