I have never played on an athletic team. As a child, I didn’t have the speed or coordination, and I had no interest in chasing balls, catching balls, or anything else involved in play. Growing up in post-war Germany, my mother associated youth sports with the Hitler Youth and the Nazi obsession with fostering the “prey instinct” through competition and strength. These concerns conveniently aligned with my feelings about gym class.
But during the long, cold, dark spring of 2020, I found myself the mother of an 8-year-old son who wanted nothing more than to play ball. This was the crux of early Covid. There were no organized sports, activities, babysitting, or school. Will’s sisters (both teenagers) did not want to participate in this activity. Her husband was a prey lover, but Will was greedy for prey. So I put on his spare baseball glove and taught him how to catch and throw.
American film and literature includes stories of baseball fathers and sons, from Donald Hall’s essay “Fathers Playing Catch with Their Sons” to the father on the baseball diamond in “Field of Dreams.” is ingrained in him, and he goes beyond death to participate in a baseball game. Caught with my son. I’ve always thought of the game as a proud male tradition, laced with the pathos and psychodrama of inherited hopes and aspirations, the lore of secret, unspoken codes of masculinity.
But when I picked up the gloves, the game’s imagined masculinity gave me a certain freedom. I wasn’t modeling what it meant to be a man or recreating rituals from my childhood. Will didn’t have a hard time meeting my expectations, even though I might have a hard time meeting his. He was a teacher here. I have come to appreciate his patience, attention to detail, and encouragement.
We weren’t even talking. I’m a writer who loves putting things into words, but Will doesn’t always like my questions or boring mom talk. Here, our intimacy was measured not in words but in the way we threw. More than anything, the simple need to keep the ball in the air allowed us both to be fully present.
Will was an excellent coach. We have broken down the catching and slowing motion into a series of separate steps. Just bending his elbow, putting his weight into the throw, and following through after the release. Over time (in my case, my lack of experience didn’t mask my natural talent), I learned to overcome the frustration of consecutive bad throws and failures, and to improve my performance. I learned to sometimes reduce my efforts in order to fit in. To take a breather and reset.
We got into a rhythm and played on dead-end streets for hours. It wasn’t always fun. I got grumpy when I missed the ball too many times. And on cold days, it was hard to get up from the couch and go outside to throw a ball.
Miraculously, our games continued even after the lockdown was lifted. I still love the satisfying feeling of hitting the ball into the mitt, the magical feeling of stopping the ball in the air. I like the thrill of reaching a certain number of consecutive passes, the sole focus of my combined concentration. Most of all, I love spending time outside with my son.
Will is currently 12 years old and is on a travel baseball team. I have nothing to offer in the form of meaningful “practice”. Our roles have been reversed. Now I ask him to get up from the couch and play.
Parenthood is not only filled with children turning into young adults and leaving home, but also with letting go of a lot of little selves along the way to adulthood. The smiling, round-cheeked toddler becomes her shy seven-year-old. The thoughtful, shaggy-haired kindergartener becomes her clean-cut, Celtics-obsessed fifth-grader. At times, the urge to cling can feel frantic. The only way to know the time accurately is to remember the following: this for a moment, this boy, this place. ritual and repetition.
When we first started playing, we started a few feet apart and took a step back after each completed catch to increase the distance between us. Now, when we play, I’m always next to the pine tree and Will is by the mailbox. His height is now almost a foot taller than at the beginning. Muscle memory kicks in quickly, even if time has passed. He catches, pulls his arm back, bends his elbow and releases his hand.
