A League of Our Own

I thought of this blog the other day while staying with my sister. I was sitting at the kitchen table talking to her step-son. He was talking about how excited he was about starting football practice soon. Then he said, "It must have sucked for you that you never got to play any sports". I then told him that I had played baseball for a couple of years, on a league for kids with various disabilities.The league was started by my occupational therapist, Mary Hager, and her husband in 1990 or 1991. She was working with me at the school one day, and was talking about the league and she asked me if I would like to join. I was completely excited about the opportunity to try something I never thought possible. I remember going and watching my brother play baseball and basketball, and both my sister's were cheerleaders and majorettes. I had such a good time watching them in these activities, but it never occurred to me that I would ever be able to participate in any sort of sport. Anyway, I told Mary that I would love to participate in the league, and I went home and told my parents about it and they were excited as well. A week before the first game, my sister's had a majorette festival, and on the way home my Father was talking about how Eric had played baseball and basketball...and Emily and Leslee were majorettes. After he finished I said, "It's my turn now." He seemed so happy that I had said that, because he told me that I had such a great attitude about things. Playing baseball was so much fun, I remember that some of the kids would try to hit the ball by having someone pitch to them, instead of hitting it off the tee. I wished that I could've tried it, but it was much easier for me to use the tee. Whenever I was in the outfield I would drive my family nuts, because if the ball wasn't coming my way, I would play in the dirt...lol. The adults would always tell us they didn't keep score, because in tee ball the score wasn't important, and that we should just have fun...each team kept score in private, but it didn't matter to me what the score was or anything like that...just feeling like a player was wonderful. I played in the league for about 3 years, because after you reached a certain age, you couldn't play anymore..kind of like Menudo. Anyway, at the end of each season, we would have our final game on the baseball field next to ours, because it had lights and everything. We even had an announcer who would introduce us when it was our turn at bat....it made me feel so great whenever my name was called, like I was the only one on the field. I hope that you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. Again, thanks for reading.