This blog was contributed from one of our readers, Kay Eltman. If you would like to see yourself published, feel free to send us your story and if we like what we read we will publish it.
On Tuesday I attended my second game of the year. Baseball has been part of our lives of my family and sitting in the Mezzanine out in right field, I was reminded why I love this pastime and the simple innocence that gets lost sometime.
There was a young girl not more then 8 years old watching the game behind me with her Dad. Father/daughter night out, almost a lost art these days, she was so hooked on this game and was asking all the right questions. She was not there to gobble cotton candy, gulp vats of soda and just be on a sugar high, she was there to learn and her enthusiasm was infectious.
At one point I asked her if this was her first game and she said no, but her dad added that she was very little the last time, and now she really enjoys it and follows along. I told her that I was about her age or so when I came to see the Mets for the first time, and I got to see Willie Mays hit a homerun that night, after a brief blank look, I told her to look him up tomorrow and she’ll understand.
After the dramatic 10th inning with Damion Easley hitting the game tying homerun the her energy level rose to a new level, which after 9 innings of it I didn’t think it could get much higher, but I was wrong. After the 11th inning her Dad said to her “We have to go, you have school tomorrow”. Well she pleaded, as only a daughter could do with her Daddy and insisted, “I want to stay and see them win, I know they will”. Dad gave in, and I’m sure he was glad to oblige because it ended just as she said it would, with a win. She was jumping up and down and giving out high-fives to everyone around her.
Perhaps I’m a romantic, but I’d like to think that in 35 years from now she’ll tell some young kid in the stands about her fun night at Shea, just as I told her how I saw the great Willie Mays.
Sometimes we get lost in the headlines of million dollar contracts and accusation of performance enhancement magic pills, but I’m glad the innocence of one little girl Met Fan brought me back to how it should be just root, root root root for the home team.
Ya Gotta Believe!
Kay Eltman
