I absolutely love the game of baseball. I love lots of sports but baseball is a romance it's different it's got a texture and an

aura and a smell and a feel in a time of year there's something magical about it and part of it is the

the physical perfection of the dimensions of the game at least the infield and the variety

of the different shapes of stadiums that you get with different outfields

because that part doesn't matter as much.

But the thing that I think really makes me love baseball is dads and kids.

And specifically, my dad and me he was tireless in teaching me how to play that

game and love that game and I remember the first time he hit me in the face with a baseball, I mean he wasn't trying to,

it just wasn't very good with a glove, but he was starting to show me a little bit of trust and get the ball to me with a little more

zip on it. I just didn't make the play. And I remember this thing that is one of many things that is one of many things that binds us together.

And there are so many lessons that I've learned in life

from playing ball with my dad and talking about ball with my dad and still to this day

even as my dad approaches retirement and I am a dad myself if he comes over and it's a summer

evening I grab a ball glove and we go and throw the ball around just back and forth

back and forth back and forth and talk about the stuff the big stuff the important stuff the little stuff the things we've processed together as a father and a son since forever.

I remember one particular point in the development of baseball with my dad where I had an epiphany.

We're out in the backyard. This was in Iowa when I was a little kid and you know it's his perfect field of dreams night

and dad's got pretty heavy wiffle balls

that he's throwing me in the backyard.

They weren't the really thin-walled ones

that would float around and were really easy to hit

with the big red bat.

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