I love baseball. So when one of our 'July that flies on by' events was a movie night watching the Sandlot I was stoked! What is it about it? I grew up in a small country town that revolved around it. Proms were moved if our boys were at state and whether or not your boyfriend played, you were at the games aviators on, sunflower seeds in, and sandals off (the fewer tan lines the better.)There's something about it. Whether a small town high school game or a big city major league game there is just. something.about it. When I watched The Sandlot with my friends tonight it all came rushing back. Summer nights. Childhood friends. Red vines.
I think that's what it is about baseball. Everyone can remember one unforgettable night that involved it. Whether it was what happened before, during, or after doesn't matter. If you had a great day or night and being at a baseball game fit in
to that time somehow, baseball serves as a porthole to that memory. I have so many. First, it was baseball games with family. 
Driving the two and a half hours to my cousins in Bothell, and then our entire families going to get subway before to take in with us into the Mariners games and eat red vines and peanuts during (though I have to admit I don't like peanuts, if I'm at a game I'll eat them.) Then it was baseball games with friends. Sitting in the hot sun of central Washington cheering on our one and only Selah Vikings. It was at this point in time when cute, baseball appropriate outfits became necessary. This was middle school and high school and the boys looked good in their baseball pants so we needed to look good in our shorts. Then it evolved to attending baseball games with significant others, again returning to Safeco field. These were the good ones. The ones at which you looked onto the field (at eye level because you could afford good seats now that you had a job) and thought that everything was right in the world. You had your strawberry lemonade, the field lights were turned on in that miraculous building and the roof was open on a clear night in the late Spring and Summer. Life was good.
My baseball attendance has now further evolved into me. Just me. Just how I like it. I don't mind catching a game every now and then with a friend, and my sister and I make quite good baseball buddies because of our mutual upbringing in that small baseball town and our mutual love for the game, but the best games are when I'm by myself. Just me, the game, and my red vines. When I go with friends its fun but I never get to pay attention. We always end up talking about boys or school when all I want to do is watch the game. Whether it's Vikings, Mariners, or Huskies the mascot makes no difference. I would be just as happy watching eight year olds play because it's the memories.
Oddly enough, when I got home tonight (or should I say back downstairs as we watched it in the living room of my housemates) and got online to blog about my love (though some may say it is an obsession) for baseball, the first headline on MSN was this. Call me crazy, but that's the works of baseball in play. Magic.
P.S. If you want to hear one of the greatest songs ever written, listen to this. R.I.P. Dave Niehaus.
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