Friday, March 30, 2007

My first softball practice. EVer.

Oh. My. Shattered.

ASS.

Let me ask you something. If a hard, dense little ball is hurtling at you very very fast, is your instinct to walk TOWARDS it, with your hand out to greet it?

Or is your instinct to go, "GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!", cover your head and run the other way?

Cause my instinct is the latter. My teammates? The Pantone 132s? (It's a color from this whole book of colors that designers use. Specifically, Pantone 132 is a shit brown. Nice.) My teammates HURL themselves toward that god-awful frightening ball, they RUSH toward it like a ball of million-dollar bills is coming at them. They hold their HAND, their TINY HAND, up in the AIR and they actually CATCH the ball.

If I were them, I would have beaten me with the bat.

And when did bats stop being wooden? When my Uncle Jim played baseball the bats were wooden. Of course, I was like four when I saw my Uncle Jim play baseball. All I remember is that he always won, and I did not get the concept that his TEAM won and not him (which pretty much sums up my team player attitude toward life) and that the concession stand had candy apples.

The only other woman at the practice yesterday was The Gnasher, a coworker who is my age who was on her All-Star team in high school. By the way, I have no idea what that means, but I assume it means she can really play softball. And guess what? She really can.

Now, normally, The Gnasher is the type of woman who hates my guts immediately on sight. That athletic, no-nonsense type always detests me.

When I was in college, I hostessed at a restaurant with this girl who owned a horse. She was quiet, had long silky no-nonsense brown hair, and was the epitome of quiet confidence and COMPLETE LACK OF HUMOR. There we were, day after day, her with her quiet brown hair and me with my giant New Wave hairdo and 57 rubber bracelets. One time a family came in, and they had to wait at the bar till their table was ready. I went to the bar and called them. "The Pool party? Your table is ready."

As soon as I heard myself say "The Pool party," I started snickering, and it just got funnier and funnier to me, until by the time I sat the family, I was bent over, convulsing and snorting. I went back to the hostess stand to tell Quiet Brown the story, and she quietly and gently said, "I just don't think you're very funny."

I hope a horse stepped on her.

Anyway, The Gnasher, who is not a humorless dolt like the hostess, but does have that I-am-scared-of-nothing-and-I-actually-enjoy-athletics thing, was extremely kind to me. In fact they were ALL extremely kind to me. The way you are kind when a really slow old person gets in front of you at the airport, and walks one step an hour. You know how sometimes they will smile and apologize and you get really really condescending and use your old person voice? "Well, that's okay! Don't you worry!" But in your mind you are thinking "COME ON YOU OLD CODGE. YOU MAY BE RETIRED, BUT I ACTUALLY HAVE SOMEWHERE TO BE."

They were like that.

And may I add the disclaimer that I actually really like old people a lot? I did not want you to think I am a completely awful person. I really do like the elderly. In fact, my love of living things kind of goes like this:
  1. Cats
  2. Old people
  3. Barry Gibb

I am just saying that sometimes I get impatient. Which I am grateful to my coworkers for not being with me.

I have to go to work now, so I will have to tell you later about the GIANT BRUISE on my palm from holding the bat wrong.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can't imagine what paroxysms you would have been in had the family been named Donner instead of Pool.

-Beleaguered Officemate

Jenn said...

Even if Quiet Brown (love the nickname) didn't think you were funny I sure do!

Anonymous said...

June you have always been one of my most entertaining friends. By the way, speaking of baseball bats, did I ever tell you that story about Jeff Hayner...

Anonymous said...

Did I not predict this way back when you first told of your plan to be on the team?

Now see, if you'd gone to the police academy like Kelly and I, then you would be a top-notch athlete and be able to take out the pitcher with your bare hands.

And lastly, how can Nancy Wilson not be at least #4 on your list?

Anonymous said...

I told the Bean you joined a baseball team and you really didn't know how to play. I asked her if she had any advice for you and she said, "Well...you just have to keep your eye on the ball."

Anonymous said...

Do you know who the Donner Party was (were)?