We Are Our Stories

Saturday, May 29

This morning I started reading this new collection of essays by Salman Rushdie. And the very first one, “Wonder Tales,” is about our vast appetite for stories, an appetite that awakens in our early childhood and doesn’t really return to slumber until we are no more.

Rushdie does assert that for many people (too many these days?) the appetite evanesces for good, long before those people do.

“For some of them,” he writes, “stories began to seem irrelevant, unnecessary: kids’ stuff. These were sad people, and we must pity them and try not to think of them as stupid boring philistine losers” (4).

A bit harsh? But maybe true?

But he goes on to say: “I believe that books and stories we fall in love with make us who we are, or, not to claim too much, that the act of falling in love with a book or story changes us in some way, that the beloved tale becomes a part of our picture of the world, a part of the way in which we understand things and make judgments and choices in our daily lives” (Ibid.).

He says that our falling in love with too few books throughout our lives could explain why “we make so many bad judgments” (Ibid.).

But—I was thinking as I read these passages—stories come in more than one form: films, plays, TV shows, sporting events (isn’t part of the appeal of a baseball game that we can never be sure what will happen? Never be sure how it will end?).

My last question makes me think of a baseball novel I loved, The Iowa Baseball Confederacy (1968) by W. P. Kinsella (who wrote another baseball novel that became the popular film Field of Dreams). As you baseball fans know, a baseball game, theoretically, need not ever end, and so it goes in this novel, inning by inning ...

But Rushdie is clearly right that stories have been with us from the beginning and continue to be a major part of our lives. The tales we tell at work, at school, around the dinner table. Conversation that lacks the rhythm and pace and arc of a story is invariably boring—even a dull story is better than no story.

Stories come in endless variety. Stories on TV news, on TV shows (where writers of British mysteries seem to have a boundless bag full of murder plots!).

People at the coffee shop are full of tales.

And need I even mention the Internet and social media?

Or blogs?

It’s no doubt true that fewer people these days are reading serious, literary fiction. But, to be fair, much “serious, literary fiction” has become exclusive, difficult to read, aimed at a far narrower audience that those folks that Dickens and Trollope and Jane Austen wrote for.

Shakespeare, who was very popular in his day (1564-1616), was careful to aim some parts of plays (even some entire plays themselves—e.g., The Merry Wives of Windsor) at the rowdier parts of his crowds. Hamlet has the Gravedigger; King Lear, the Fool.

So ... stories go on, in ever-evolving formats. But writers now well know that popularity means cash. And fewer of them now are interested in writing novels, plays, etc. that are well reviewed but sell poorly.

Sun Goes, Rain Arrives

I remember, years ago when I began teaching The Call of the Wild (mid-1980s) I read in the final chapter (when Buck and John Thornton are heading into unknown territory looking for a fabled mine) this passage:

They went across divides in summer blizzards, shivered under the midnight sun on naked mountains between the timber line and the eternal snows, dropped into summer valleys amid swarming gnats and flies, and in the shadows of glaciers picked strawberries and flowers as ripe and fair as any the Southland could boast.

Strawberries in the Far North? Seems it’s true, as the image above confirms.

And now, much older, I’ve begun to see the symbolic qualities of things ...        

 ***

Right now, I’m sitting in what I call “Venue Two”—one of the two places (besides bed) where I spend most of my time. It’s just started to rain. It’s about 1:30 p.m. 

Venue One is the place where I spend most of the morning. In the family room (toward the back of our house), in an easy chair. I read the New York Times online; I text a little doggerel to my family each day; I read fifty pages of one of the books through which I’m journeying.

Venue Two is in the front room, on the couch, where I read The Plain Dealer and the Akon Beacon-Journal online. (I read the replica version of the three papers I’ve mentioned.) The only old-fashioned newspaper we read is the Sunday New York Times. It’s a long habit we can’t break; it’s a long habit we don’t want to break.

It’s been sunny the past week or so—sunny and warm (even hot). In other words, wonderful. The sidewalks have been full of people walking and jogging; the streets, with people bicycling. It’s thrilling for me to watch—thrilling and depressing. You see, I can’t do any of that myself anymore. No walking, running, cycling. I have a hard time even getting from room to room. Falling is no longer a distant danger; it’s so near that I can smell its vile breath.

Joyce now does 95% of the work around the house; I’m pretty much useless. The things I do do she has to assist. I still bake bread and scones only because she assists me. Although I can prepare my own breakfast (a scone and Keurig), and although I prepare most of my own lunch (a piece of sourdough toast, a cup of yogurt and blueberries and sliced strawberries), she does 90% of the suppers (it used to be just the opposite). For going on two years now, I haven't grilled outside, something I used to do frequently each spring, summer, and fall.

My exercise—which used to feature cycling and working out on machines—now comprises walking to the next room, slowly climbing upstairs, descending even more slowly downstairs. It's a situation that is not likely to improve. I'm invariably dizzy, and no doctors (and I have seen a lot of them) can figure out why. I have a walker that I use, but it doesn't help if I start to fall. I'm down, and that's it. I’ve been to the ER three times in these Covid months.

I am grateful for many things, Joyce the most. Without her I could not be home—I probably shouldn’t be home. She won’t hear of the alternative.

I am grateful for our son and his family, who come up to see us every couple of weeks. We can’t  go down there any longer. Too dangerous.

Oddly, I’m grateful for Facebook, for it’s via that medium that I keep touch with so many who have been so kind to me over the years—in boyhood, in my teaching career, and in all sorts of other ways.

But the sky is definitely darkening.

**

And this what that passage from The Call of Wild has got me thinking about. Our lives resemble those Yukon strawberries and other vigorous summer life there.

Before our lives—darkness and cold and ice.

Brief moments in the sun.

And then ...

Baseball, Part 7

A few loose ends ... things I forgot in earlier posts ... and final thoughts.

I had never seen a major league game until the late summer of 1956 (we’d just moved from Oklahoma to northeast Ohio). Dad took my younger brother and me to see the Tribe play, and I was stunned by the field at old Cleveland Stadium. The green grass dazzled me (grass was khaki-colored in the late summer and fall in Oklahoma)—and all the people.

I couldn’t believe how hard Rocky Colavito could throw the ball from right field; I couldn’t believe how fast the players could run, how far they could hit the ball.

Another game, later on, the Tribe was playing the Yankees (complete with Mickey Mantle; Yogi Berra, my hero; Whitey Ford; Phil Rizzuto; et al.). As I mentioned in an earlier post, I was a Yankees fan at the time (all those TV Games of the Week, all those World Series wins). We were sitting in the upper deck, and I was cheering for the Yanks, and a (drunken) guy near us inquired, incredulously, “Are you a Yankees fan?” Proudly, I replied. “Yes,” “Then I hate your guts!” he snarled and whirled around. I was 12 years old.

A number of years later, thinking myself a future star of the Indians (I’d jettisoned the Yanks by then), a foul fly landed right in my hands. I dropped it. I should have known then ...

For many years I attended several games a year (often on opening day), listened or watched just about every other game. I saw the Tribe play in Boston and Oakland. We have some dear friends here in Hudson who had season tickets, and they would invite us to games from time to time. 

In the 90s when they were getting into the playoffs (Jim Thome, Albert Belle, Kenny Lofton, et al.), we, (yes,, Joyce, too) became fanatics. Joyce would get so nervous at times that she would leave the room where the game was on.

Earlier—and later—in my life I read baseball books—ones for young adults (The Kid Comes Back, et al.), ones for adults: e.g, Bernard Malamud’s The Natural, W. P. Kinsella’s Shoeless Joe and others of his baseball books, Philip Roth’s The Great American Novel.

But when I got my cancer diagnosis in late 2004, my interest in sports began to wane. I had once been a major fan of all Cleveland’s teams—the Tribe, Browns, Cavs. But, one by one, I lost interest in them all. Can’t explain it, really. I just did.

I still played some with our son and grandsons.

And then that, too, ended. Here’s how.

I’ve developed some symptoms that some excellent doctors have still not been able to figure out—or treat. Dizziness. I now fall—and cannot stop myself—and have made several trips to the ER as a result.

But one Memorial Day a couple of years ago we were visiting our son and his family. I, on impulse, went out to their back yard to play a little Wiffle Ball with our older grandson. We took turns hitting and pitching.

My first time batting, I nailed his first pitch, earning surprised sounds of admiration from him.

The second time I swung, I missed the ball—but did not miss the ground. There was no stopping myself: I swung; I missed; I hit the ground. This was no slow-motion earth-collision. I swung, missed, and hit the ground—hard. I was nearly unconscious as a result.

Our daughter-in-law’s a nurse, and she hurried outside to check me out. I was all right. Embarrassed but all right.

And that, my friends, was the last time I played the game even in a simple form.

And now? I do check the Tribe scores occasionally, but I’ve not watched or listened to or attended a game in years. I couldn’t name more than a player or two.

And so it ends ... 

Baseball, Part 6

And then it was our grandsons' turn ...

Born in 2005 and 2009, the boys are as different as my brothers and I are. The younger loves to read and draw and imagine; the other excels at math and science. They are two very different instances of excellence—and both are stunning human beings (just saying—totally without bias, of course).

The older showed baseball gifts as well, right from the start. He bats left, throws left, and has a very strong arm—did a lot of pitching when he wasn't playing in the infield. Hits very well, too.

Son Steve coached him for a year or so and attended his games religiously (as he did our other grandson’s); his mom and other grandfather were also there regularly.

They live in Green, Ohio, about 30-40 minutes away from us, so we didn't get down to see games all that often but greatly enjoyed it when we did. There are few things more fun than seeing a grandson excel at something!

But a few years ago our older grandson broke his leg—and badly so; he lost a full season of baseball and was not able to recover some of the speed and agility he'd had.

So he took up golf—now plays whenever he can, played last fall on his high school JV team (he's just finished his sophomore year). And he just found a summer job: working at the front desk at the Firestone Country Club. (Somewhere, his great-grandfather, from whom he got his middle name, must be smiling: That man, Joyce’s father, worked virtually all his life for Firestone down in Akron.)

One of the great perks of our grandson’s job: He can play the course anytime he wants, can use the driving range, the putting green. He is one happy young man ...

The younger grandson (he just turned 12) had a different history with the game. He, too, took it up early, and although he showed considerable facility, he always seemed more in his mind than in the games: He loved imagining a game in his head far more than the one that was on the diamond.

Pretty soon he gave it up and dived into books and drawing and exploring the vast imaginative power of his own mind. He’s actually writing a fantasy novel right now, and (if I may say so) the young man can write. (He’s given me peeks at it.)

Son Steve still follows the Tribe religiously; I’m not sure about his sons.

Which reminds me: Steve saw his first Tribe game when he was still a toddler. Joyce’s uncle Paul went with us down to the Cleveland Stadium on a Friday night, a night when the Tribe’s routine was to have a fireworks show right after the end of the game (most of which they lost in those days).

Uncle Paul had put little Steve on his shoulders (straddling his neck), and he was ecstatic about it all.  Until the fireworks started going off, at which time, startled, he began to cry. It took lots of subduing to simmer him down.

And so now we will wait for the next generation of Dyers ... I’ve told you about five of them. And may they have as much fun as we’ve had—and may they have the courage to leave the game when they’re ready. May they find their own fields of dreams ...

FINAL POST ON THIS TOPIC COMING UP ...

Baseball, Part 5

Our son began his baseball career in our wee front yard in Kent, Ohio—114 Forest Dr.—where we were living in the mid-1970s while Joyce and I were finishing our graduate studies at Kent State. He was not yet of school age.

As soon as I thought he was able, I began tossing a little ball to him; he quickly learned to catch and toss it back. A little later, I got him a small glove, and he would stand in front of me near the front porch, and, sitting there, I would toss an actual baseball to him. Again, he learned quickly.

He called the game BAH-bah.

But what really surprised me was how well he could see a ball I’d tossed above his head—and catch it. And how easily he would pick up the little grounders I’d roll and bounce to him.

Later, we would play little Wiffle ball games in the front yard. Joyce would pitch—or I would—and Steve would just nail the ball and run around in an imaginary diamond of bases. We would run and retrieve the  ball and try to catch him before he got home, giggling all the way.

Joyce would always let him score; I, sometimes clueless as a father (as I still am), would occasionally tag him out. And he would cry. That always made me feel good ... not.

After these games I was always amazed how well he could hit. (He hit the ball so hard that sometimes I couldn’t get out of the way—and it hurt!)

“This kid is going to make some coach very happy,” I said to Joyce.

And he did—and, one year, I was one of those coaches.

He began his team career in Lake Forest, Illinois, where Joyce and I were teaching in 1978-79. (We had both finished our Ph.D.s—and I thought I wanted to be a college professor; I didn't and returned to secondary school teaching as quickly as I could.)

Lake Forest had T-ball teams for beginners. I'd never played that version of the game, but Joyce and I signed him up, got a T for home practice, and off he went.

From the beginning he was an excellent fielder, always one of the best on his team, no matter what level. But he had my "speed," not my father's. So second base became his position. He sometimes played in the outfield but saw so little action out there that he discovered that he loved watching the airplanes flying in and out of O'Hare—not all that far away.

We had always let him use whichever hand or foot seemed sensible, so he was (and is) a mixture: threw right, kicked left, batted left.

He had a little period of "adjustment" swinging at a ball on a T. Once he struck out—and cried (reminding me of little Danny back in Oklahoma). As a wee one he never did like making an out—or an error. (Who does?) 

He played very well, all the way through the little league games in Hudson (where we moved after Lake Forest), and Joyce and I saw pretty much all of them. Great fielding, solid hitting (from the left side he loved liners to left-center).

One year—when I was on sabbatical and not directing plays in the spring—I became an assistant coach on his team: the first-base coach. I had lots of fun, and Steve did very well.

When he got to high school (Western Reserve Academy), he continued his fine play, but I didn’t get to see many of his games. I was still directing plays in Aurora, and we always did a spring show—as Steve well knew. He had come to Harmon Middle School with me, grades 6-8, and was in seven plays I directed those years. (I got to teach him in 8th grade, but that’s a post for another day.)

His career essentially ended in high school. He did not play in college—I don’t know if he even tried out. But he and I would play catch—or hit flies to each other. Always great fun.

But a great thrill for both Joyce and me was this: After graduating from university, he came back to Ohio to get a master’s in journalism at Kent State. And no sooner did he finish it (early 90s) than he got a gig at the Akron Beacon-Journal, the paper Joyce had grown up with in Akron.

One day, Joyce and I were driving over to Hiram on some back roads, and we saw that a local farmer in nearby Mantua had set up a kind of Field of Dreams in one of his cornfields: The outfield ended in a cornfield.

Steve convinced his editor to let him write a story about it, and he actually got himself into a game out there. And ran around that Field of Dreams with the same boundless glee he’d shown as a toddler who’d just nailed a Wiffle ball.

TO BE CONTINUED ...

Baseball, Part 4

After my final failure in American Legion ball in the early 1960s, I knew my dreams were dead—the dreams of playing at any higher level.

But playing the game had not totally left my life. For example, at the end of my first year of teaching (1967), the final day, there was a game between the faculty of the Aurora (Ohio) Middle School and the 8th graders, who would be moving along to the high school in the fall.

I played third base, got a couple of hits, but the play that brought the biggest reaction from the students was when I grabbed a hot grounder, paused to examine the ball, then fired it to first. Out!

The kids couldn’t believe that (1) I could grab a hot grounder, (2) I could throw that hard and well. (Actually, I couldn't believe it, either: I hadn't played ball at all for a few years.)

My status rose.

And I learned a lesson: In later years—the years when I had lunch duty—I would play ball in nice weather with the kids. And thereby nudge my status upwards a bit. (Did the same with basketball—but that's for later posts.)

Later, at the request of colleague and friend Jerry Brodsky, I joined him in a softball league over in Tallmadge. A team of teachers.

And that was a lot of fun. For some unfathomable reason they put me at short (I could tell one of my teammates was annoyed by this—as well he should have been). I hit pretty well, made most of the plays, and impressed Joyce, who came to the games with our infant son, Steve. He caught no foul balls there, but Steve did catch the mumps, courtesy of a careless mother who brought her infected child to a game.

Some years later when I was teaching at Western Reserve Academy, I played some more teacher-league softball games with some colleagues. I played first. Don't know why. I hadn't ever played the position very much; I am neither tall nor lefthanded. My only virtue was that I had no trouble catching throws—accurate and errant (all those years behind the plate).

But I didn't know how to be careful.

A baserunner once ran me down, and I was woozy the rest of the game.

But that was about the extent of my playing career ...

By then, though, our son had already begun his career ...

TO BE CONTINUED ...

Baseball, Part 3

 Okay ... now the part I’ve been dreading ...

When I entered Hiram College in the fall of 1962, the baseball coach approached me right away. He asked me if I was going to try out for the team. I was pretty sure I wasn’t: By then I knew my, uh, limitations. So I gave him some kind of noncommittal reply.

“We hope you do,” he said. “We need a good backup for Slotta.”

Jake Slotta was Hiram’s catcher—a junior—an all-conference player. I knew I’d be spending at least two years on the bench—and hitting about .142.

I went out for tennis instead—made the team (we weren’t very good)—ended up getting four varsity letters. Made some great friends, some of whom still haunt me on Facebook.

But the summer after my freshman year, I got a call from the coach of an American Legion team in nearby Newton Falls, Ohio. He invited me to join the team.

I did. Didn’t catch much (they had a guy with a much better arm—and I was ... rusty). I played mostly in the outfield. Nothing remarkable.

Until the end of the season when we were in the Legion finals and were playing the championship game in a park in Alliance. It was a nice infield, but the outfield was roly-poly—like a golf course.

My dad was there watching the game—I think my younger brother, too. I was in right field.

Early in the game (I was batting 9th, which tells you all you really need to know), I came up with two out and a runner on third.

The pitcher threw so hard I could hardly see the ball.

I swung blindly at one and lined a clean single into left-center. I ran, stunned, to first while the Newton Falls fans gave me a standing O.

That would change fairly quickly.

About midway through the game, a batter hit a long fly to right. Certain I could catch it, I turned and ran. And, eye on the ball, I did not notice that I was dipping down into part of Roly-Poly Land. Before I knew it, I was on the ground, and the ball was rolling merrily away from me. (Can a ball laugh?)

I caught up to it, whirled and fired toward the infield, missing the cutoff man by, oh, a half-mile or so, and the batter trotted on home.

To a standing O from the non-Newton Falls fans.

I dreaded the end of the inning, but it came swiftly. As I neared the bench, the coach, without looking at me, told me I was out of the game.

And I was—in more ways than one.

TO BE CONTINUED ...