We signed Luis up for T-ball this year, a team for 3 year olds, based in the neighborhood, that advertised no practices and Saturday morning games. It sounded ideal. Turns out that there were quite a few practices, many games on weekday evenings and not as in-the-neighborhood as we'd hoped, but it was still, pretty much, ideal.
The coach hosted a meeting at his house about a week before practices began. Luis was not at all psyched about the idea of t-ball, the coach, or the kids he saw at the meeting. He spent the whole 45 minutes climbing up on to either Diego or me, asking if it was time to go home yet. Going to the first practice brought out a similar attitude for him. But slowly, slowly he warmed up to it all.
On our way to the second practice, he told us, "I used to not like Coach or t-ball. But as it turns out, Coach is my friend." Whew! Glad Luis came to that realization on his own.
After a couple of weeks of practices, the kids on the team seemed to have learned how to hit the ball of the t-ball stand, how to run the bases (usually) in the proper order, and how to kick up big piles of dirt. Fielding the ball was pretty iffy, and usually ended up with several kids piled on top of each other. But they were having fun, and us adults enjoyed the show.
More fun than playing t-ball was scaling the fence.
Today was Opening Day. The league has teams with kids as young as Luis up to, I think, early teenagers. It was clearly with the older kids in mind that the schedule was made for the day: teams arrive at 8a, march in a "parade" at 8:45, Opening Ceremonies where all teams are introduced at 9a, and an hour break before the first game at 11:00a.
Trying to line the team up for the "march on" at opening day. Note the bucket of candy in the coaches hand.
Luis was not too keen on being left on the field with the team an the coaches while Diego and I went to join the spectators. There was much crying on his part and guilt on our parts. But in the end, Luis did march with his team (though he refused to where his hat) and participate in the events. Between the Opening Ceremonies and the first game, we took Luis out to breakfast. He promptly fell asleep in the car on the way back to the fields, at 11:30a. Sigh.
A little pre-game nap
The game itself was pretty hilarious. Much like practices, hitting and running the bases worked pretty well. Every kid gets to stay at bat until they hit a playable ball. Then, they advance one base, regardless of the fielding that is done. Then, each kid gets a turn at bat, regardless of the outs. It is definitely a fair process that lets each child get a turn. But also much like practices, the fielding of the ball was like watching the Three Stooges. Some kids ran after every ball, regardless of their position on the field or where the ball was hit. Some kids never noticed that a ball was in play, or that kids were running the bases.
Not sure what position Luis is (just to the left of the asst. coach in black pants), but at least for this moment, he was looking in the right direction.
Luis's first at-bat. Thank goodness for an exceptionally patient batting coach, Coach Thomas.
No comments:
Post a Comment