The Chris Moeller Archives

Frozen in time

The deeper you go into this life, the more you see the shades and textures. Within them, lies the beauty of it all, I'm convinced. Age brings reflection, and with a little luck, some feeling of contentment. In baseball, our grand American pastime, this reflection is welcomed and nourished. The pace of the game allows for meditation. We see ourselves during the game for what we are, and what we have been.

Summer 2005 arrived for me during a ballgame Monday night. We had just endured a maddening two weeks in the upper Midwest, weather-wise-- below-normal, chilly conditions punctuated by a mix of record-low temps, frost conditions, and meteorologists' hype in central Iowa on the morning of May first. But a warm front began blowing through late Monday,coinciding with an extraordinary ballgame in the Major Leagues.

You've probably heard by now of the historic ninth-inning comeback staged by the Cardinals in Cincinnati. They trailed 9-3 before dropping 7 runs on the Reds in the final frame, the final 5 runs coming with two out. In so doing, they manipulated time. There was no clock in place to limit the Cards' production, no mechanism that allowed the Reds to control the ball and use up the remaining time, such as there is in the other team sports of football, basketball, hockey, and soccer. In the gentleman's game, the only way to it is through it, and to his credit, Reds' closer Danny Graves didn't walk the Cards' hitters. He went right after them. Unfortunately for him, the Cardinals were better on this night-- better at a historic clip. Reminiscent of the time Superman reversed time by spinning the world backwards, Jim Edmonds and John Mabry drove long home runs and the Cardinals delayed the third out until they had erased the six run deficit and established a surplus of runs of their own. I recognized all of this as the normally-stealth arrival of "endless summer."

Leave the timepiece at home when you attend the ballgame. It heightens one's ability to absorb the experience. Our greatest president knew this. When a committee of the Chicago Republican Convention arrived in Springfield, IL in May of 1860 to inform Abe Lincoln of his nomination for president, the Great Railsplitter was engaged in a game of baseball on the commons, bat in hand. "Tell the gentlemen that I am glad to know of their coming," Abe told a messenger, "But they'll have to wait a few minutes till I make another base hit."
True story, but what is it that still resonates about it today? Well, for one thing, the man pitching to Lincoln that day was Jeff Fassero, but there's more. There's something about baseball connected to youth that appeals to all of us. It provides a rhythm to the season, and a burgeoning hope to our struggling lives. If we could somehow manage just one more hit, we tell ourselves; and then one more, and another after that, and another, then we will have conquered time.
And then we will be young forever.

posted by CM @ 11:39 PM