For Every Season

One of the coolest things about watching JP play baseball on MBA's JV team this season has been running into so many of his Dodgers' teammates on other teams.  We've seen Cyrus, Riley, Wes, Elijah, and Benton.  Of course, he plays with Winn, J.D., and Ethan.  All Dodgers at one time or another, which is really, really cool.

I take so much pride in watching those boys - my boys - play baseball in high school.  The entire experience of running the Dodgers and coaching those boys for nine years, fall and spring, in WNSL, all-stars, and the occasional tournament was life changing and transformative for me.  The boys, my assistant coaches (whom I miss seeing regularly), the parents, the grandparents.  All of it.  The best days of my life as a father have been spent on baseball fields with JP, Joe, and their teammates.  

JP, batting leadoff for MBA this season, already has batted against Cyrus (Hillsboro), Wes (David Lipscomb), and yesterday, Benton (Ensworth).  Watching my son in the batter's box, batting against boys he has known and played with since he was five years old is tremendously special.    

When Benton struck JP out with a curve ball in yesterday's game - a 7 - 5 - MBA win - I couldn't help but smile a little bit.  After the game, Benton told me the curve ball was a birthday present for JP.  Classic Benton.  I was smiling a bit wider, though, when JP lined a 2-strike single into left field against an Ensworth relief pitcher to plate the go ahead run for the Big Red.  He was due.

Although it drives JP crazy, I think, I've been walking on to the baseball field after games to take photos of my Dodgers together.  I can't help myself.  Our Dodgers parents' group loves it when I circulate the post-game photos on a group text.   

When I walked on to Ensworth's field yesterday after the game, I met Benton walking in with a teammate from right field.  As I hugged him, I marveled at the fact that he's taller and bigger than me now, his long, blond hair past his shoulders, as always.  My guy, almost grown up.

"Benton, I'm so proud of you," I said, my voice choked with emotion.  "You pitched a great game."

"Thanks, Coach," he replied.  

Benton had the sweet, teenage awkwardness about him, unsure of how to react in what was a bit of an emotional moment for both of us as we stood together on the Ensworth High School baseball field in the dying sunlight of a beautiful fall evening.  In that moment, I was overwhelmed with a flood of baseball memories, with Benton and JP in the middle of almost all of them.

"Coach."  

That word means everything to me.  I've gotten out of the mindset of seeing myself as a coach as the boys have gotten older and are coached by other, so it was nice to hear him say it.  For so long, coaching baseball was my identity.  It was how I saw myself, first and foremost.   

I started coaching Benton when he was five, maybe six years old, so I've watched him grow up.  I've been there through his successes and failures on the baseball field, through struggles and moments of triumph.  I've had a front seat to all of it.  The best seat, really. 

I think what I've loved about Benton over all of these years together is that he's a lot like me.  Stubborn.  Competitive.  Confident.  Emotional.  Sly sense of humor.  Tough but with a heart as pure as gold when it comes to his friends and family.  

Benton's always been a bit of a gunslinger and I've loved that about him.  He's a quiet leader and he instilled confidence in his Dodgers' teammates, always, with his demeanor on the mound and his confidence at the plate.  I could see that's still the case during and after the MBA-Ensworth game in the way his teammates interacted with him. 

From a very young age, Benton has been serious about baseball.  I can remember when the boys were young, really young, playing coach pitch baseball on fields four and five at Harpeth Hills Church of Christ.  While the other Dodgers were running around before a game, acting like five or six year olds act, Benton quietly put his baseball gear in the dugout.  He was the first boy to learn how to keep up with his own gear.  He always stacked it neatly in the dugout in between at bats or going out to the field to play defense.  While other boys were rummaging through the dugout, looking for their hats or gloves, Benton was always ready to go.

I thought to myself then, so many years ago, that this one is a baseball player.  This quiet, serious, respectful, blond haired boy is a baseball player.

And you know what?  I was right.  

Benton is a baseball player.  A damn good one.

Sweet 16

When I woke up this morning, I was the father of a 16 year old son.

How did it happen?  

To quote Ernest Hemingway in The Sun Also Rises, "Gradually, then suddenly."  

That quote perfect describes how I feel about JP turning 16 years old today.  It seemed like his childhood would last forever and that I would be the father of a young boy forever but as it turns out, that's not how it works.  It seems like yesterday that I planned my Saturdays and Sundays around our morning or afternoon strolls around the neighborhood, as often as not ending up at Bongo Java for coffee.  Today, he's driving.

"Gradually, then suddenly."

Last night, our friend, Kim, had to go to the emergency room and went there to be with her because her husband, Hal, is out of town.  When I got home, JP was just going to bed.  Jude, laughing, told me later that all night long, JP was practically bouncing off the walls in anticipation of turning 16.  He's such an even keeled kid.  Never too up or too down.  For him to get so excited about something and to show that excitement is out of character for him but very cool, too.

This morning, asked him if he wanted to drive to school.  He said he wanted to ride, so he could relax and think about his day.  I think he wanted to contemplate what it means to be 16 and how things are going to be changing in a very real way, very soon.  And, too, how they will never be the same.  The truth of the matter, of course, is that they won't be. 

When I turned 16, I was overwhelmed with a profound feeling of freedom and independence.  I would never have to rely on someone else to drive me somewhere.  Never again.  I could drive myself to school, to work, or to a friend's house.  I could drive to the beach or to California.  I could drive to familiar places or to places I had never seen.  Suddenly, the world was wide open to me, waiting expectantly for me to explore it. 

I wonder if JP was feeling those things as I drove him to MBA today.  Probably that and a whole lot more.

As I so often say, I don't know what I did to deserve a son like JP.  He's a gift.  I can't remember what my life was like without him.  

16 is the big one, maybe the biggest one of all.  Happy birthday, JP.  

I'm proud of you and I love you.

It's Hard to Begin to Let Go

I've been writing in this space for what seems like forever.  

Why?  Many reasons.  To let others know how Jude's pregnancy with JP was going.  To preserve a record for my boys of how I much I loved them when they were growing up and how much they enriched my life in ways small and large.  To give my mom something to look forward to as her health began to fade.  To try to work out my thoughts and feelings as I watched my mom drift away, stolen by Alzheimer's, and finally, leave me to fend for myself on this earth.  To help me, years from now, remember what it was like to be a father of young and growing boys.  

Most of all, I think, The Stork Stops Here is a love letter to JP and Joe.  

My sons are my world.  They are why I get up in the morning and go to work and why I stay late.  I can deal with the stress of my job because I am doing it to provide them with the life they have.  I work late sometimes, and miss things, to continue to build and maintain a successful career so I can be the provider I need to be.  I run, in many ways, for them.  I want to try to maintain my health and youth for them, because I became a father relatively late in life.  

Now, though, I find myself in the earlier stages of imagining a life without JP and Joe in it every day.  How will I be able to do that when the time comes?  

How will I be able to say goodbye and watch them go out in the world to live their own lives?  I don't know if I can do it.

Later this week, six days from now, JP will turn 16 and get his driver's license.  How can the boy I strolled around 12South and Belmont in the Baby Jogger City Elite be on the cusp of driving himself all over Nashville?  How?  

Just yesterday, or so it seems, I was strolling him down 10th Avenue - on what might have been our very first walk in the old neighborhood together - when neighborhood handyman Ronnie Henderson drove by, saw me, and waved.  Later, laughing, he told me I was beaming with the pride of being a first time father as JP and I strolled down the street.  He was right.  

JP's ready to drive.  That's for sure.  He's long since logged in the required hours driving with a learner's permit, mostly by driving with Jude.  He's taken the dull but necessary eight week long defensive driver's class and driven with an instructor.  Think driver's education classes in the old days.  A few weeks ago, he took and passed the driver's test.  All that awaits is for him to pick up his Tennessee driver's license on Thursday.

The problem, of course, is that I'm not sure I'm ready for him to drive.

A large part of my fear is that I can recall all of the stupid things I did as a young driver.  Speeding.  Driving recklessly at times.  Listening to all kinds of music, loudly, on the Jensen triaxial speakers in my '66 Ford Mustang.  Drinking beer, then driving.  All of it.  It's a wonder I survived unscathed.

JP is a different kid than I was at 16.  That's what I tell myself, anyway.  I don't think he will take the chances I took as a young driver.  With all of my heart, I hope he won't, anyway.  

This is one of those times when being a control freak and averse to change is not helpful.  I have no choice but to trust JP and have faith that he will be a careful driver.  That he won't take unnecessary risks, like I did.  That he won't drink and drive, like I did.  That he won't drive and text or talk on his cellular telephone, like I do.  That he won't race a train across the tracks on the way to a job loading and loading tractor trailers after his freshman year of college, like I did.

Most importantly, I have to have faith that God will watch over him, protect him from other drivers, and keep him safe.  And He will.  I know that.

Still, this feels like the beginning of a long goodbye, first to JP, and then to Joe.  From the first sleep away camps at 10 or 11 to driving to, finally, college.  

I don't think I'm ready for that, not by a long shot.

Saying Goodbye to Santa Rosa Beach

Back to reality.

Following a nine hour drive in a lot of construction related traffic on I-65, we arrived home last night a little after 6 p.m.  It was, needless to say, a long drive made shorter, however, by JP driving the first two and a half hours.  He's a good, safe driver, and I was glad to get him some experience driving on a road trip, particularly since he will be getting his drivers license in less than two weeks.  

Friday, our last day at the beach, Joe was especially vocal about not wanting to leave.  Early Friday evening, Joe and I hung out at the beach together and threw the football while Jude and JP rode bicycles down to Blue Mountain Beach.  It was overcast and most everyone else had left the beach for the day.  It was nice to steal a few minutes on the beach with Joe, just to throw the football and enjoy each other's company.  

I was thinking about how each member of my family gets something different out of a trip to Santa Rosa Beach, or so it seems to me.  In truth, each of us probably needs something a little different from a week there, too.  We actually talked about it a little bit at dinner Friday night at Basmati's.  

For sure, Jude needs her morning walks on the beach, looking for seashells.  I think she needs the solitude and the peacefulness.  She needs to be at the beach at least once a year, I think, if for no other reason than to have those early morning walks on the beach.  I think it recharges her batteries.

Joe loves spending time in the ocean, which he did on this trip every afternoon.  Not a lot of people braved the cold temperature of the water, although Joe was one of the exceptions.  He's so happy playing in the ocean's waves, with JP or by himself.  He's like me, in a way, with his love of the ocean.  Joe also loves - and I mean loves - to eat at different restaurants for lunch and/or dinner when we're in Santa Rosa Beach.  

JP's a little harder to figure out, although I know he loves being in Santa Rosa Beach.  Like me, he loves to  go for runs almost every day we're there.  He also loves to ride bicycles - traditional and the electric bicycles that he and I rented for the second year in a row.  I know JP needs the break from school and academic intensity that is MBA.  Unwinding time is important for him, too.

For me, I like the feeling of familiarity that I get from staying in Old Florida Village in Santa Rosa Beach. It brings me comfort.  I know what to expect.  No surprises.  Of course, I love - love - having the time to run almost every day.  l love having the Longleaf Greenway Trail a half mile away, so much so that I ran on it three days during out stay.  I love having time to read and watch movies.  I also love bumping into residents and guests staying in Old Florida Village and striking up a conversation with them.

Being home again is nice but I already miss the beach.  

SRB

When you vacation in the same place for more than 15 years like we have in Santa Rosa Beach, you gain a unique perspective on it.  We're not locals, of course, but we're not really outsiders either.  Coming down from Nashville once or twice a year and seeing the changes firsthand, I guess, is akin to seeing another family every year and watching the changes in their children from one year to the next.  Suddenly, one year, they're no longer children and you're left pondering where time went.

As I sip my coffee in Sunrise Coffee in Gulf Place, I wonder if Sunrise Coffee will be even be here the next time we come to Santa Rosa Beach.

The Gulf Place Town Center always has seemed like the town square for Santa Rosa Beach.  Late last year, Gulf Place was sold to a developer of some sort.  As often happens in those kind of deals, the new owner unceremoniously evicted several of the longtime shops in Gulf Place, including YOLO Board & Bike, from whom we had rented bikes in the past.  A little internet research revealed it wasn't an exorbitant rent increase; rather, the new owner simply kicked the shipowners out.  

There's been so much growth in Santa Rosa Beach and he surrounding area, particularly the last five or so years.  Shunk's Gulley, next door to where I sit, was a needed addition.  A place to eat, drink, and watch sports on one of several flat screen televisions upstairs or downstairs, all with a view of the ocean across the street.  There's a new burger bar next to Shunk's Gulley, where we ate lunch yesterday.  It's fine but nothing to write home about.    

Gone, sadly, are Elmo's (an early favorite of JP's), Pickle Factory (the boys' favorite place for pizza), the Grove (here only briefly but where we had lunch and spent a wonderful afternoon last spring break), and Blue Mountain Creamery (it's still here, actually, but no longer owned by our friend, Jed's, family).   Grayt Coffee Shop - a Grayton Beach favorite of mine in the early years - moved from one location to another, then closed several years ago.  

One of the things that attracted us to Santa Rosa Beach in the first place, so long ago, was the fact that it wasn't as crowded and congested as Seaside, Seagrove, or Rosemary Beach.  There is a "see to be seen" aspect to those places that's missing from Santa Rosa Beach and, probably, Blue Mountain Beach.  More locals in Santa Rosa Beach.  I fear that's changing, though, with all of the recent growth in Santa Rosa Beach.  

As JP pointed out to us before we left Nashville, the MBA varsity baseball team always take a trip during spring break to play games out of state, often to Florida.  If he keeps playing baseball and makes the varsity squad in the next couple of years, spring break would look very different for us.  In other words, it's possible this could be our last spring break in Santa Rosa Beach, which is a sad fact to contemplate for sure.  

Sometimes, I wonder what life will be like, especially for Joe, when JP goes to college.  On spring break, for example, will Jude and I take Joe to Santa Rosa Beach?  What will Joe do by himself at the beach?  He and JP are so close and perfect companions, throwing the baseball with each other every day, running together, or riding in the golf cart.  Things will be very different for Joe after JP leaves for college.  No two ways around that.  

JP is driving Jude and Joe to Gulf Place as I write this because we're going to try breakfast at the Perfect Pig.  We love eating dinner there but we've never tried breakfast.  Joe is our culinary tour guide and he's excited about breakfast, so there you go.

My Other Happy Place

I write often about my happy place, Monteagle Mountain.  Less than an hour and a half from my house in Nashville, a trip to Monteagle or Sewanee always recharges my batteries.  I would be there every weekend if I could.  

My other happy place, though, is Old Florida Village in Santa Rosa Beach, FL.  For at least 15 years, Jude and I have been coming here with the boys for spring break, fall break or, occasionally, our end of summer vacation.  From the minute we pull up in the driveway of the house we've rented for the week, I start to relax.  

I love it here.

As a native Californian, the beach and the ocean are in my blood.  I could sit in a beach chair for hours, reading, and staring out at the ocean.  The ocean calms me and clears my head.  Being near it makes me feel alive in a way that I don't when I'm elsewhere, landlocked.  Something about the ocean releases my soul and encourages it to wander a bit and appreciate firsthand our beautiful life and this enchanting planet  on which we're privileged to spend our days and nights until it's time to go home forever.

As I sit on the downstairs porch in the fading sunlight, listening to Falling Slowly by Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova and sipping a bourbon, I'm overwhelmed with my great good fortune.  What did I ever do to deserve the family I have, the friends I have, the life I live?  God has blessed me well beyond what I deserve but I am grateful beyond measure nonetheless.  

JP and I went for a six mile trail run this morning on the Longleaf Greenway Trail near our rental house.  Over the years, I've run that trail so many times.  It's one of my favorites and to be able to share it with JP is a gift.  It's not lost on me - it never is - that I'm blessed at age 57 to be able to run with him as a peer.  Sure, he's faster than me but on a longer run, I don't slow him down that much.  At least, that's what I tell myself.  Either way, my guess is that there aren't a lot of 57 year old men going for a six mile run with the number one ranked freshman cross country runner in the state.  

The point, of course, is that I'm beyond grateful to be able to run with JP.  He loves running the same way I love running.  I hope that never changes.  

Last night, Joe couldn't sleep, in part because we have some spring breakers in the house next to us and they were doing what college boys on spring break do.  Drink beer and talk, loudly.  Joe wandered downstairs, laid down next to me on the bed in the guest room, and watched the end of the Lakers win over the Timberwolves.  Just us, up late, watching the Lakers.

I never take for granted how lucky I am to have two sons that love sports the way I do.  Our love of sports is the common language we speak that many others don't.  It's part of our bond.  A love of sports and especially a love of the Laker and the Dodgers.  I don't think that will ever change.  One of my mom's greatest gifts to me was a love of sports and now, I've given passed her love of sport along to my sons.  

Could I live here one day?  Maybe.  Probably.  I don't know.  

I often wonder where the boys will end up, short term and long term.  Will JP run cross country or track in college and, if so, where?  What will Joe be like in high school?  Where will he go to college?  Will one or both of the boys go away to college?  I hope so.  I want that for them, as hard as it will be for Jude and me to not have them near enough for us to drive to in a day.  Still, I want them to be independent and to have their own lives.  To do that, I think they need to go away to college.  

I like the not knowing, if that makes sense.  It's like a book I have in my book case that I know I want to read but I haven't, not yet.  I know I'll love how the boys turn out.  Their personal story.  But I also like not knowing, at least not right now.  I like knowing that God willing, I'm going to get watch their lives unfold.  That's maybe the greatest blessing of them all. 

My family doesn't need a a lot to be content on vacation.  We don't have to travel to an exotic locale.  A nice place to stay but not too nice.  Nothing pretentious.  A beach.  An ocean.  A place to run.  A place to throw the baseball.  Restaurants.  A swimming pool or two.  Books to read.  And, most importantly, each other. 

Really, that's all we need.  

Each other.  

Dodgers Reunion

Yesterday, MBA's junior varsity baseball team played the first official game of their nascent baseball season, a non-league tilt against Hillsboro.  The game was uneventful, as MBA easily defeated an undermanned Hillsboro squad 15 - 3.  Neither team hit particularly well but Hillsboro's infield had several errors that led to a couple of big innings for MBA.

What was really cool, though, was seeing several of my former players on the field.  For MBA, Winn Hughes (shortstop), JD Bashion (catcher), Ethan Deerkoski (pitcher), and JP (second base).  For Hillsboro, Riley Hayden (third base), and Cyrus Connor (starting pitcher).  

Cyrus - one of the all time Dodgers - started on the mound for Hillsboro.  He always was the youngest, and quietest, player on our team.  In those days, he was on the small side but I always suspected he would grow bigger than the other boys in the end because his dad and my friend, Ike, is 6'6".  Sure enough, Cyrus is 6' now, taller than me, with a mini-afro that I love.  He's still on the quiet side but as was the case when he was younger, he interacts easily with his teammates, joking around and laughing, even racing one in a spring in left field after the game.  

I always told Nalini and Ike, Cyrus's parents, that he had a future as a pitcher.  He's a kid that God blessed with a magic right arm.  Although he was smaller and thin as a youngster, the whip action of his right arm as he pitched created snap on the ball.  Real speed.  Now, as he's filling out to be a long-legged, superior athlete - just like his dad, who played basketball in college - his fastball is in the low-80's and he has a wicked curve ball.  Impressive, particularly since he's a freshman.  

JP lead off yesterday and I missed his first at bat against Cyrus, a walk on five pitches.  JP stole second and third, too, but was stranded after Cyrus got the third out.  In the end, Cyrus gave up three runs in two innings, striking out four batters (three looking at curve balls).  He also hit a double his first time up.

JP didn't do anything noteworthy at the plate, although he got on base three times on an error and two walks.  That's leadoff hitter's job, I supposed, to get on base one way or the other.  I'd like to see him get his hitting back on track, though, like it was during the middle school season last year, when he was pulling the ball and hitting with power.  He played flawlessly at second base, making all of the routine plays.  

It's going to be a fun baseball season, I think, as we run into more players I coached in years past.  I miss those days terribly, of course, but time marches on, doesn't it?

Dodgers forever.

James McMurtry

Those who know me well, who have known me the longest, know that Tom Petty was my guy.  forever and always.

Those who know me best know that for 30 + years, James McMurtry has been my guy, too.  McMurtry hasn't found the fame that Tom Petty did - not even close and, really, who has.  He's not as prolific as Tom Petty. Again, who is?  Still, for more than three decades, he's dropped an album every four or five years and I've absolutely loved every one of them.  

From Too Long in the Wasteland (1989) to the most recent album, The Horses and the Hounds (2021), and all of the albums in between, it's been a helluva ride with great music playing the entire trip.

Why James McMurtry?  I've wondered that myself.  He's an incredible songwriter to begin with, and I love that, of course.  His ability to turn a phrase is reminiscent of John Hiatt (whom I spoke to at a wedding last weekend) and John Prine, two of my other favorites.  His songs are like short stories that rhyme, told in four to five minute vignettes.  Often times, McMurtry grabs me with the very first line of a song.  

McMurtry flies under the radar, too.  Something about that appeals to me.  He's never going to write a pop song and that makes him different from Tom Petty.  What he is going to do, though, is write beautiful, lyrical songs about people struggling to survive in a world that can be harsh and cruel.  Those aren't often happy and uplifting songs, either.  What they are though - to me, anyway - is real.  Very, very real.

Like so may of my other favorites, Lucinda Williams, Bob Dylan, Hiatt, Prine, etc. - McMurtry doesn't have a classically appealing singing voice.  What he sings about is much more important to me than how he sings it.  That's true for those other artists, as well.  I place the emphasis on songwriter when I use the phrase singer/songwriter.  Always have.    

I can't remember how I found McMurtry.  My friend, Todd Blankenbecler, got into him around the same time, right after college.  I'm a huge fan of McMurtry's father, Larry McMurtry, who wrote the Pulitzer Prize winner, Lonesome Dover (my 2nd all time favorite book) and many others.  I've always been fascinated by the talent in those two men, father and son, similar but different.  My guess is shortly after college, I learned that Larry McMurtry had a son who was a musician and I sought him out.  That's only a guess, though.

I saw McMurtry last Sunday night at 3rd & Lindsley, a small, old school Nashville music venue.  As another fan said to me that night at the show, "it's a good room."  There used to be a lot of good "rooms" where live music - rock and roll - was played in Nashville - 328 Performance Hall,  the Playroom at 12th and Porter, the Cannery, Mercy Lounge - they're all gone now, except for 3rd & Lindsley.  

I was first in line for the show when I arrived at 4:30 p.m. (doors opened at 5:30 p.m.).  I could hear McMurtry and the band playing inside during the sound check as I sat on the concrete bench in front of the entrance, reading The New Yorker.  I chatted up a few other fans while I waited, a couple of whom had been to Saturday night's show, as well.  I gave away my tickets to the Saturday night show because I had to attend a wedding in Knoxville.  

When the doors opened and I walked in ahead of everyone else, I felt like I was home.  Again.  Although I was surprised to see that most of the tables in front of the stage were reserved - that's a new 3rd & Lindsley policy that allows them to make a little extra money, which is cool - I still got a table near the stage, slightly elevated, with a perfect view.  

Jude joined me and we had dinner, which was cool, since we don't get many nights out.  The opener, Betty Sue, was fantastic.  She reminded me of Maria McKee, actually.  

McMurtry, of course, was fantastic.  I don't think I stopped smiling the entire show.  When he played an acoustic, no microphone version of Blackberry Winter, I was mesmerized.  His performance of that song along remind me of why live music is so special.  It's a memory I'll treasure forever, watching him walk around the stage, no band, playing the acoustic guitar and signing to the crowd, all of leaning forward slightly to take in every word of the song.

I'm so glad I got to see James McMurtry again.  Being at the show made me feel happy to be alive.  That's no small thing in this day and age.