Baseball
Town Teams, Ice Cream, and the Minnesota Twins
It was music to my ears, eliciting a Pavlovian response.
On a lazy summer evening I'd suddenly hear unusual noises: the swinging metal
drawer pulls on my parents' dresser flopping once, twice, against the dresser
drawer; the 'click' of the light switches in the bedroom (and bathroom) going
on, off, on, off; the subtle scrape of metal car keys against a hard surface as
they went from the kitchen counter into my father's pocket. That final noise was
the signal, the 'key' as it were, for my mouth to start watering for ice cream.
Thursday nights at the Millside Tavern in St. Michael there was apparently a special deal on ice cream cones. Maybe it was 'two-for-one' cones, maybe it was 'half-off' -- I really didn't care. Just so long as we took that slow, peaceful drive to the little bar by the dam on the Crow River. Mom and Dad would sit in front and I, of course, would be perched on the edge of the back seat, leaning over the front seat between them. I could only do this while my dad was driving -- I think he was the only one tall enough to see in the rear-view mirror over my head. My parents would talk about whatever news came up over the course of the day, and I'm sure I did my share of babbling. Mom and I carried most of the conversation, though, as dad was a pretty quiet guy. (He wasn't mad or crabby or anything like that...he just didn't have a lot to say most of the time.) But the background to that conversational drive nearly every week was not music, but baseball.
Every radio broadcast and every televised Minnesota Twins game made it into our cars and home if my dad had anything to say about it. The son, grandson, and great-grandson of farmers, my father's tastes and pastimes were simple. He fished a little, golfed a little, and watched a lot of baseball. What I didn't know for a long time was that he had played some town team baseball when he was younger. So had my mother, playing softball with a bunch of her friends. And did I mention my grandfather, who played on a Rogers town team that proudly won 15 of 22 games in 1911? I was never much of an athlete myself, but my brother more than made up for it by playing high school and town team ball for most of the past 30 years.
So you see, I was destined to love the game. I was attending
my brother's games practically as soon as I could climb the bleachers. My dad
would watch the game, keeping pretty quiet except for the occasional, "Oh,
for...", which was the beginning of an exclamation of frustration that he never
really finished in my presence. My mother, on the other hand, never hid her appreciation for
the team. My brother often appeared embarrassed by her vocal
encouragements, but on the few occasions when she wasn't at a game the other
players would ask him, "Hey, where's your mom, man? It's too quiet out there!"
I went to my first Twins game at the old Met Stadium when I was in grade school. The biggest impression it had on me then was that I could sit outside for three hours and have people deliver the best junk food ever, right to your seat! But I also remember my dad once bringing me home a Rod Carew jersey from a "Jersey Night" Twins game. Rod was my hero after that. Tony Oliva was a close second in my heart, because I just loved to listen to him talk.
It wasn't until the summer of 1987 when I was in college that my love of the Twins really bloomed. But then, didn't everybody's during that miraculous summer? I was going to the University of Minnesota and working at a campus parking garage every morning from about 5 - 9 am. My companion during these early hours was the KQRS Morning Show. Their unabashed adoration of the local boys rubbed off on me. I was hooked.
In 1991 my dad developed Lymphoma. He went through a round of
chemotherapy, and seemed fine after that. But we knew that his time was now
precious.
The following June I had a brainstorm. Every year I took my nephew to a movie or some other event for his birthday. That year, I decided to take him to a Twins game, taking dad along too as a Father's Day present. Dad hadn't been to a game in quite a while, so I knew he'd appreciate another chance to sit in the stands. My sister, another life-long Twins fan, came along. When I called my dad to tell him about it, he said, "Well, that sounds like a pretty good idea."
I don't remember much about the game itself. I do remember that my nephew ate a lot of junk food, as a youngster at a big league game is wont to do. I remember keeping an eagle eye out for the Malt Cup guy, as malts were my dad's favorite. And I remember reminding my dad about that Rod Carew jersey he brought home for me on a long ago summer night. I think we won the game, which was a nice little gift for us all. The best part, though, came at the end of the day when my sister and I were leaving my parents' house. It was a scene as corny as a Disney movie but it was once again like music to my ears. From the quiet retired farmer after attending his last Twins game came two simple words: "Thanks, Mel."
