Baseball Camp Still On!

August 20, 2008 —You may have heard by now that Nick Gorneault was assigned to the Arkansas Travelers. Have no fear, however, matters are all neatly in hand. Terry Evans has graciously agreed to take over the role of Camp Director, should our high-flying outfielder be unavailable. Evans is another longtime Bees outfielder, and was a featured Player of the Month in 2009. If you haven’t turned in your registration and medical release forms yet, (and why haven’t you?!?), remember there is a $10 discount for early registration!

I went to last year’s camp last with my 8-year-old baseball pal, and everyone there had an absolute blast. Don’t just take my word for it. . .seeing is believing, right?

•  •  •  •  •

Photo Credit | Brent Asay (c) 2010

July 18, 2010 — Hey young ballplayers! Salt Lake Stingers/Bees ballplayer, Nick Gorneault, is offering an advanced baseball clinic at Spring Mobile Ballpark next month. Click on the flyer below to download a printable flyer and registration form.

A bit of background on our veteran outfielder. In 2005, Gorneault led the Salt Lake Stingers in most offensive categories, including home runs, runs batted in, runs, hits, and slugging percentage. He led the PCL in RBIs for much of the season, finishing the year with 0.293 BA, 108 RBI, 26HR, 179 H (36 for extra bases) and 268 TB.

Upon his return to the Salt Lake Bees this year, Gorneault was voted Team Captain after Ryan Budde was called up to the Angels. It is important to note, unlike football or hockey, in professional baseball, the choosing of a captain is left completely to the discretion of the team. Most baseball teams simply don’t have one. Thus, when the “C” gets sewn onto a player’s uniform, it is truly an emblem of honor and respect, as determined by a his professional peers. …Your friend in baseball.

Lou Gehrig, Kenichi Zenimura, Babe Ruth

I’m writing to ask you a favor regarding our beloved national pastime. My good friend Kerry Yo Nakagawa has nominated Kenichi Zenimura (1900-1968) for the Buck O’Neil Lifetime Achievement Award of the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Attached to this letter is a petition that must be delivered via hard-copy original—no emails, faxes or PDFs—in order to be counted. Also, would you print a few extras and pass them along to professional peers and personal friends?

As with so many aspects of our melting-pot history, American baseball has been shaped by immigrants and their immediate descendants. A glance at the roster of the upcoming All-Star Futures Game is but one proof of this influence.

Zenimura’s tireless efforts on both sides of the Pacific cleared the way for MLB athletes named Sasaki, Matsui, Nomo, Hasegawa, Okajima, Saito, Fukudome, Taguchi, Iguchi, Matsuzaka, Okajima, Shinjo and Iwamura. Not to mention the unique combination of an MLB manager named Wakamatsu and NPB manager named Valentine.

When Ted Williams was inaugurated into the Hall of Fame, he was gracious enough to endorse African-American ballplayers for Hall of Fame recognition:

“I’ve been a very lucky guy to have worn a baseball uniform, and I hope some day the names of Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson in some way can be added as a symbol of the great Negro players who are not here only because they weren’t given a chance.” (1966)

Buck O’Neill, Kerry Yo Nakagawa

More recently, Buck O’Neill offered the same opinion regarding our Nisei ballplayers:

“(Nisei baseball) is what America is all about. All men and women were created free and equal and (it) shows that when you make up your mind, you can be the best that you can be. Japanese Americans proved that they were the best that they could be.” (2001)

Help give Zenimura his proper place in baseball history by making sure the HOF Committee gets your endorsement no later than July 31, 2010.

Click here to print the petition

My heartfelt thanks for your support.

Anita Y. Tsuchiya — Writer, blogger, thinker

Then Matt Palmer pitched himself into a starting slot for the Angels. Sean O’Sullivan arrived from Double-A Arkansas to fill out the starting rotation in Salt Lake, until he pitched his way to Los Angeles as well. The next pitcher called up to bolster our Triple-A rotation was Trevor Bell.

When the transaction-go-round starts spinning as fast as it has this season, it seems awfully quick to the trigger to select a ballplayer who’s only been at Triple-A for just one-and-a-half months. On the other hand, Bell has been as steady as they come, even when he hasn’t gotten the run support he deserves. So

Trevor Bell was selected by the Angels in the first round, 37th overall, a supplemental pick to compensate for the loss of free agent Troy Percival. His development from Rookie through Advanced-A was steady, albeit unspectacular, with ERA stats of 3.50, 4.14, 4.22, respectively. Bell made the Double-A roster out of spring training this year, and it seems as though something clicked. In 11 starts for Arkansas, he relinquished only 54 hits and just one homer in 68.2 IP for a 2.55 ERA.

Pitcher injuries among the Angels resulted in a mid-June spot start for O’Sullivan against San Francisco and subsequent promotion for Bell, who got his first Triple-A start against division-leading Colorado. And what a start it was; a two-hit, complete game shut-out. Since then, the 21-year-old has pitched like he’s been with us all season: 2.81 ERA, 52 H, 36 SO, 14 BB, 64.0 IP. Best of all has been his ability to go deep into the game, averaging 7.1 innings per start, with two 9-inning complete games. Bell doesn’t have a blazing fastball, and relies heavily on ground-ball outs. Mentally, he is one tough competitor. One of my favorite moments from this season was a five-pitch duel between Bell and major-league veteran Sal Fasano.

Much has been made of Bell’s off-season acting career, as well as his relation to the original Bozo the Clown. And while these are interesting media bytes, they aren’t nearly as intriguing as a couple of other extracurricular activities engaged in by the youngster from North Hollywood, CA.

At the start of the 2008 season, Bell joined Barry Zito’s “Strikeouts for Troops” campaign, in which he pledged to donate funds to the charity for every strikeout he made. Later that summer Bell was sent down to Single-A Cedar Rapids shortly after horrendous flooding had devastated the Kernels home city, along with several other Midwest cities along the Iowa and Cedar Rivers. During his short stay, Bell took a tour of the area and wrote a personal check for $2,500 towards rebuilding efforts.

What is noteworthy about these contributions is how uncommonly rare it is for low-level minor leaguers to be thinking of something other than their on-field performance. For yours truly, it’s yet another reason to cheer on our latest young gun…Your friend in baseball.

Suddenly, she burst into tears, “I’m thinking I’m never going to make it. I’m wondering if I should just quit?”

I was caught off guard, and had to think over what she’d just said. I’d retired just the season prior. One of the hardest decisions of my adult life, . . .still. I had come to the point in my career when I needed to enter big money competitions in order to progress, as a legit athlete and marketable figure. I was a long, long shot. It would take luck as well as hard work if I was going to make any sort of mark beyond regional acclaim. The problem was, I simply didn’t have the funds. I managed to hold back the tears while I called my equipment sponsor. I thanked him for supporting me and told him to give away my slot. I hung up the phone, and sobbed.

I struggled to come up with something positive to say,”Hey. I’m sorry you’re having such a tough time. Um, geez, . . I can’t really tell you what to do.”

I mean, what could I tell her? We knew the odds. And I should point out, her talent exceeded my own by light years. I had no illusions about that reality. I was never good enough to be in her position. Perhaps even, it was still too fresh for me to be philosophical about my own loss. I’m sad to say I don’t remember being much help.

As time went on and I spent more time away from the field than on it, I came to find the words I’d been at a loss to provide in that crossroads moment. A message tempered by experience—mine, hers and dozens of young athletes over the years—and for me, a rather simple one.

Don’t ever quit because you’re afraid of failing. As much as it hurts to be told you’re not good enough, it’s nothing compared to the pain of wondering whether you might have been…Your friend in baseball.

Later, I recalled my own experiences with military personnel. Way back during my college days I had a dorm-mate, our “middle-aged freshman,” who was among the last to have served in Vietnam. He was a Green Beret. He was smart, funny and a fine athlete. I recall he and several dorm guys entering an intramural rugby tournament, although their most notable accomplishment of the day was sending three team members to the student health center.

A conscientious objector at one point in his life, he tried to reconcile his change of heart by becoming a special ops medic. One quiet evening over a few beers, the two of us found ourselves immersed in a conversation about what close combat was like, . . .after your service revolver rounds had been spent. Or how it felt to have survived multiple, harrowing battlefield encounters with your best buddy, only to watch him killed by a careless (and remorseless) driver during a weekend leave in Bangkok. These were topics he’d chosen to write about for his English composition class; he seemed to realize the therapeutic value of finally processing these long-buried memories. I suspect it was also easier for him to talk about them with a woman (who did her best to not flinch), rather than the teenage guys in the dorm.

I also remember how the “GI Bill” during the 1980s and 90s offered an attractive form of financial aid for low-income students. Without the Navy, another dorm-mate of mine could not have afforded his undergraduate and medical school education. Back then, he and many other young men and women were able to fulfill their duties for the most part without enduring enemy fire or extended, overseas deployments. As we know, all of this changed on September 11, 2001.

These personal moments spent with people I like and care about got me wondering, . . .how do military families deal with a loved one getting summoned to active duty in places such as Afghanistan or Iraq? Who pays the utilities, insurance or rent while the household provider is away? What happens when a family member comes home in not-quite-one piece and unable to work? How do families cope with the ongoing trials of an “invisible injury,” such as post-concussion syndrome (PCS) or post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD)?

And so I have a favor to ask of you, dear readers, on this Day of Our Independence. Would you visit the USA Cares website today? They can use your help, whether it be in the form of goods, time or cash. Or please consider purchasing a special edition “Ordinance Bat” from iFungo; 50% of the profits go to USA Cares.

Bonus offer: Bring your iFungo Ordinance Bat receipt and show it to me at the ballpark, and I’ll throw in two Box Seat tickets ($27 value) for the July 24th Pioneer Day game/fireworks show. I’m easy enough to find—section 7, row 2, seat 8, right next to the Bees dugout.

And lastly, as you are settling onto the grass for BBQ and fireworks, or if like me you are heading to the ballpark, please take a moment to pray for the safe return of our military men and women, as well as for the health and happiness of their families. . .Your friend in baseball.

BTW, if you haven’t yet visited Ashley’s blogsite, Everyday Life, please, do. This is a young woman who knows her mind and speaks right up. My kinda gal. . .Your friend in baseball.

I have something exciting to share with all of my followers! Teleflora has approached me [Ashley] to participate in a Father’s Day Giveaway!

You may be asking, why in the world would she be doing a giveaway, with a florist, for Father’s Day?! Well, they have informed me that they are teaming up with the Prostate Cancer Foundation to help raise awareness for prostate cancer and raise funds for research. Did you know that prostate cancer strikes out one of six American men? That is an alarming statistic! As part of the partnership, in conjunction with the launch of Teleflora’s new baseball-themed bouquets, Teleflora will be making a donation to the Foundation. There is an additional sweepstakes through Teleflora, as well.

About the giveaway: The winner will get one of two bouquets sent to them, or their desired recipient. Here are the two choices. . .

To participate: E-mail me [Ashley]<everydaylifeblog@hotmail.com> with your best story about a memorable experience you have had with your Dad. (By Dad I mean, any male father-figure in your life; uncle, brother, step-dad, grandfather, etc.) The catch? The story has to be baseball related. You didn’t think this was just about being gushy did you? The story can be sentimental, funny… whatever!

The top 3 stories, picked by me [Ashley], will be posted on the blog and all the readers will get to vote on their favorite. All e-mails should include:
1) the story
2) your full name
3) telephone number that you can be contacted at
5) name of bouquet recipient
4) address where the bouquet should be sent
5) the name of the specific bouquet you like should you win

* Please use the ‘E-mail Me [Ashley] ‘ button in the sidebar.

* This information will only be seen by me [Ashley], with the exception of the winner who’s info will also be given to Teleflora for delivery purposes.

The deadline for all e-mails is midnight of June 16th. The top three winners will be posted on the blog on June 17th-18th for voting. The winner will be officially announced and their information sent in to Teleflora on June 19th for a June 20th delivery.

About Teleflora: Teleflora has been connecting customers with the nation’s best florists for more than 70 years and is affiliated with 20,000 member florists throughout the US and Canada. They use the freshest flowers and personally deliver the bouquet to you in a vase. Teleflora guarantees satisfaction with every gift which is why they are personally designed by a florist in your recipients area. This means there’s no risk of damage or dehydration.

A girl and her dog became trapped within a powerful eddy after misjudging the intensity of the spring melt and had to be rescued by two other women. Rescue efforts were delayed for a few minutes when one of the rescuers went for an impromptu swim down the churning, snow-fed rapids. Fortunately, the tale had a happy ending, incurring the death only of two cell phones.

Yes, it was yours truly taking the unscheduled dip. I’m a decent swimmer and I’ve done some whitewater kayaking. That doesn’t mean I would normally attempt to negotiate a Class 3 rapid without a boat, paddle, PFD and helmet.

There is a wonderful off-leash dog park about 20 minutes from my home. The park is in a canyon at the edge of town, right before the highway climbs the mountains to Park City. Molly loves the place and so do I. There’s running water year-round and a foot trail.  The trail follows the water upstream to the point where it comes out of a huge drainage pipe that tunnels under the highway.

The mouth of the 8-foot-diameter drainage pipe is set into a concrete retaining wall. The water spills out of the pipe and forms a pool about 20 feet in diameter before spilling over into a shallow streambed. For most of the year, the pool is only a few feet deep and the streambed about a foot. On warm days during the spring, however, fed by rapidly melting snow, the flow becomes a foaming, surging torrent of flood water.

Thursday was one of those days. The kind of gorgeous afternoon when the temperature spiked up into the high-70s. There were a couple dozen cars in the parking lot when I arrived. Not far from the parking lot, Molly and I caught up with a girl accompanied by four dogs, all clustered around her. I’d guess she was around 18 years old.

She was chatting away on her phone, “Oh, I’m here at the dog park. Probably for about half-an-hour. OK. Yeah, I’ll come over. . .” her voice faded away as we got ahead of the pack.

Molly and I made a couple side-trips off trail and meandered in the general direction of the pool. I kept an eye on her as we walked near the stream, using voice commands to keep her from clambering down to her favorite splash pools. The water was too deep and too fast, and Molly is quite possibly the lousiest canine swimmer I’ve ever seen.*

*Seriously. She swims like an old lady frantically trying to keep her new perm from getting wet. Once, a bystander watched her flail around for a few seconds and asked, “Wow. That’s a lot of splashing. Is she alright?”

“Oh sure, as long as she only has to swim for a few feet.”

We were about 75 feet from the pool and I could see the girl and her dogs were already there ahead of us. Then I noticed something odd. She was in the water, swimming. And then I heard screaming, “Oh god, help me! Please, help!”

I started running and yelling, “Hang on! I’m coming, I’m coming!”

When I arrived at the pool I could see what had happened. One of her dogs, a yellow lab, had gotten trapped in the swirling eddy near the mouth of the drainage pipe. Next to him the girl was treading water and thankfully, still screaming.

There was another woman standing on the rocks nearby. I edged by her and started wading out. She apologized, “I’m sorry, I can’t swim.”

“Don’t worry. Stay there.”

I looked over at the eddy. It takes experience to understand the mysterious and quixotic nature of river currents. The key is remembering they have three dimensions: length, breadth and depth. Eddies can be particularly treacherous. Their calm surface belies a powerful current that pushes away from land and sucks under the surface. Think whirlpool. It is hard not to panic when you feel such immense forces pulling at your body. Come to think of it, in the natural order of things, humans are lousy swimmers too.

The dog and girl seemed to be staying above water, although the girl was clearly panicked. What she should have done was push the dog away from the wall and towards the main current, where the flow would straighten out and kick them right into the shallow water at the spillover end of the pool. The problem is it’s counter-intuitive to swim towards the strongest part of the current where the water is roaring and churning. It’s loud and scary. So instead, she kept trying to shove the dog closer to shore along the retaining wall, which is the strongest part of the backcurrent.

The girl was a few feet away from me with the dog right beside her. I was standing in water that barely reached mid-thigh but the current was already incredibly strong. Maybe with the woman’s help, I could reach the girl via a human chain. I turned my head back to shore for orientation, and felt my feet slip out from under me.

I barely had time to think, “Oh cr*p” and grab a quick breath, and I was under. I tried to relax and turn towards where I thought the main current was. When I hit foamy water, I swam, kicking hard. Sure enough, in a few seconds I clanged my knee and shin against the boulders. Ouch. I sat up to find myself in barely 2 feet of water.

Thankfully, the girl had managed to swim out as well. I looked at the dog. He seemed calm but clearly he was stuck.

I stood and started calling him towards me, “Come on! Come on! Here boy!”

I energetically gestured with both hands in the universal sign of “come to me.”  I was standing much closer to the main current and hoped he would angle towards me enough to get caught in it. He looked at me but didn’t move over. Of course not, since he didn’t know me.

I turned to the girl and shouted above the roaring water, “I need to you to walk over towards me. Come this way. We need to get your dog to swim towards me.”

I started calling again, and gesturing. The girl didn’t understand and started calling from her spot, still in line with the powerful backcurrent. The dog looked at me and looked at her. This was only confusing him.

“NO! Come to me and call from here. COME OVER HERE.”

She remained frozen to her spot. I could barely hear her voice, quivering and thin. She was losing strength and more critically, hope. I looked at the dog. I had no idea how long he’d been swimming. Dogs rely on the strength of the social bond within the pack, and look to us humans as the pack leaders. It’s why they make such great companions. Without his owner’s encouragement, he’d soon give up. I watched him. . .paddling, paddling, paddling. I called again. The dog looked over at me, a bit longer glance this time. I felt a heartsickening wrench flash through my gut;  I realized I couldn’t bear to watch him drown.

I started a mental inventory of objects at hand. I noticed Molly’s leash draped over my neck, which is where I often carry it in order to keep my hands free. Miraculously, it had stayed in place during my swim. A light bulb went off inside my head. I pulled the leash over my head, folded it over once  and held it in my left hand.

“Where’s your leash?!” I shouted at the girl.

She half-turned and pointed somewhere on shore. I couldn’t hear her but clearly it was out of reach. She started to wade totteringly towards the direction she’d pointed.

“NO! Stay here. Forget it!”

I shouted over to the woman, “Do you have your leash?”

“It’s just a tiny one. It’s no good. Sorry.”

I looked back at the dog. Still swimming. That’s good.

The mind is a funny thing. As I stood there thinking about what to do, I noticed I’d lost my hat. I watched as it rapidly traced out the eddy’s circular current. It floated past going clockwise, drifted by the dog and circled back towards me a second time. I reached down, grabbed it and stuffed it into my back pocket. OK, well, at least I saved my hat.

I looked down at Molly’s folded leash in my hand. Four feet of heavy duty nylon strapping. It might be enough. I turned back to the girl.

“How strong are you?” I shouted.

“I’m. . .oh, right now, not very strong. I’m so tired.” She had dark blond hair, was about my height and slightly overweight, not at all athletic. I hoped she was stronger than she looked. I waded over to stand by her.

“That’s OK. Here, take this and hang on tight.” I handed her the loop end of the leash. I was counting on the muscle memory of a familiar task to help her remember to hang on. I took a firm grip of the snap end in my left hand.

The woman on shore watched as I handed the young girl the leash. She had dark hair and looked about my age. She was shorter and much more slender, I’d guess at most 100 pounds. I was the biggest and strongest of the group; all 5’5″ 135 pounds of me. Well, here goes.

“OK, now hold on tight and don’t let go. OK?” I looked at the young girl, holding my gaze until I got eye contact.

She nodded quickly, “OK.”

I looked at the dark-haired woman and nodded. I started wading out. I took a couple steps and turned back to make sure the girl was holding on. In her shock, she was following me into deeper water.

“Stop RIGHT THERE! Don’t move! ” I commanded in my most authoritative voice.

I thrust my forefinger forcefully through the air, as if I was going to ram it all the way through her chest to a place 6 inches behind her.

I bellowed, “DON’T YOU DARE COME OUT HERE. YOU. . . STAY. . . .RIGHT. . .THERE!”

The girl stumbled backwards and half-fell, half-sat in the shallow water.

“NOW. . . .DON’T MOVE. AND DON’T LET GO OF THE LEASH.”

The dark-haired woman seemed to understand what I had in mind. She was saying something, although I couldn’t hear above the roaring of the water. She waved the girl over and grabbed the leash a bit further down. They were set.

I turned and started slowly wading back out towards the dog. The current was grabbing hard at the backs of my thighs. More odd thoughts. The water seemed awfully warm for snowmelt. My feet weren’t even numb, although I’d been standing in water all this time.

I waited for a bit, judging how much further I could go before I lost my footing. Just then, a ripple of current pushed the dog over towards me slightly. I lunged for his collar with my right hand. I felt my feet floating up and the leash go tight in my other hand. I rolled over onto my left side.

I turned my head, “I got him!”

I slipped my right arm around the dog’s chest and felt him stop paddling. Yup, he was tired.

Hand over hand, the woman and girl hauled us to shore against the backcurrent. There wasn’t much I could do to help because the cement wall was slick with algae and I couldn’t get any firm footing.  Thinking back, I have no idea how they managed to pull us out. The dog was probably 60 lbs. That’s nearly 200 pounds of waterlogged woman and dog being sucked by thousands of pounds of water.

The dark-haired woman was shouting over encouragement. “How are you doing? OK?” She was awesome.

“Yup, fine! Keep pulling. That’s good! ”

I felt my left knee touch the rocky bottom. I loosened my grip on the dog but immediately tightened up again because he wasn’t even trying to swim. I crawled on one hand and both knees until I felt the dog’s feet push against the bottom. I let go and watched him crawl up the rocks.

I crawled up after him. I reached out for a handhold, and suddenly realized I was reaching for the dark-haired woman’s leg. I pulled back, not wanting to pull her in. She grabbed under my armpit to pull me farther onto dry land.

“It’s OK, go ahead and grab onto me. Are you alright?”

I couldn’t help it, I laughed. “Yes, fine. Thanks. Where’s the dog?”

I looked over and saw him mingling with his furry friends. Too tired to even shake off the water. I stood up slowly and smiled at the woman, “Thanks.”

“I’m so sorry. I can’t swim.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m a pretty good swimmer. But that,” I jerked my thumb back over my shoulder, “is not swimmable. And for god’s sake please don’t ever do what I just did.”

I was soaked from the top of my head to the soles of my shoes. Water was streaming from my hair and down my back. I looked at the girl. She was shaky but smiling.

“Omigod, you’re all wet. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s OK. I’m just glad everyone’s alright. Now, do we have all of our dogs?”

During all the excitement, of course, all the other dogs including Molly had been running back and forth along the boulders. Molly was particularly distressed by my shouting. I caught occasional glimpses of her running into the water and looking at me. At one point she actually jumped in and quickly thrashed back to safe ground. Thank goodness she didn’t follow me.

Suddenly I heard the dark-haired woman gasp, “Oh no!”

I jerked around to see a different dog, another yellow lab mix, leap after a tennis ball that had dropped into the water during our scrambling around. The woman instinctively made a move towards the edge and I put my arm out across her chest. Fortunately, the momentum of the dog’s leap carried him right to the far edge of the eddy. He got the ball into his mouth just as the main current grabbed him.

“Good. See? that’s exactly where we want him.” I kept my arm blocking the way and pointed to the current with my other hand.

The dog looked as though he was one of those fake logs at a waterpark ride. The current literally spit him up over the surging water, where he perched atop a foaming, standing wave for just a moment, before landing on his feet in a foot of water, . . .with the ball still in his mouth. He ran quickly over to us.

I turned back to the girl, “OK. Do we have all of our dogs NOW?”

“Yes. Oh, thank you so much for saving my dog.” The girl was a disheveled mess of sagging clothes and tangled hair.

I gave her a bear hug. “You’re welcome. I’m glad everything turned out alright. So, keep the dogs out of the water, right?”

I turned up the trail and headed back to the car. Amazingly, despite all the people in the park that afternoon, not a single other person showed up throughout this entire adventure. I walked about 30 feet up the trail and met a pair of 20-something men walking towards the pool.

I threw my hands in the air and exclaimed, “Where were you when we needed you?”

“Huh?”

“Never mind. Word of warning. The water’s really high today.” I held out my arms straight so they could see my soaked shirt clinging to my arms.

“Um, OK. Thanks.”

I slogged back to the car. Molly kept close, uncharacteristically subdued. I wasn’t the only one feeling the effects of the post-adrenaline phase. Somewhere along the way, I felt my back pocket and discovered my hat. I pulled it out and put it on my soggy head. A thought came that made me smile. I was too tired to laugh. Nature is wild, wonderful and powerful. And if you don’t show some respect, she will kick your *ss.

When we got to the car I pulled out Molly’s brush. I wasn’t quite steady enough to drive just yet. I knelt down by the car and took my time brushing my best pal from nose to tail. Molly was lying on her side, fully extended, eyes half closed. Dog Heaven must be like this. I clucked out the usual compliments about how smart and gorgeous she was. And complained about what a hairball she was, and spoiled.  Slowly, muscle memory brought me back to this world. When I stood up, I saw two small puddles of water in the grass where my knees had been.

Looks like I didn’t get giardia. D*mn, it is wonderful to be alive. . .Your friend in baseball.

Postscript . . .Two public service announcements. . .

One. Please be extra cautious around rivers and streams during the spring melt. People can and do drown in streams as shallow as four feet because they underestimate the force of the current.

Two. I made a choice. One that easily could have ended disastrously. Please do not use my case as any sort of  “how-to.” River rescue should be left to fully trained and well-equipped experts.