Out and About

Dazed & dazzling by Jerry Kelly ’96

It was a play that defined a season. The sky was blue, the grass blue-green; a gentle breeze carried comfort from the general direction of right field. The diamond, designed for little leaguers, was dotted with Kenyon summer science scholars, BFEC staff, a village official, a new faculty member, local entrepreneurs, several Erics-come-lately, and an athletic mutt named Duke, determined leave his mark.

The batter hit a bounding ball past an infielder, a baserunner rounded third and was galloping for home, and the throw from the outfield hit the runner squarely-with a meat thud-in the back of the head. Classic comedy: someone else's pain became everyone else's laughter.

No real damage; this was softball, after all, and the runner emerged from his daze OK. What we were really laughing at was the simultaneous confusion on the basepaths: runners reversing direction, then reversing again, and Duke suddenly sprinting into the middle of the chaos, touching third, making the turn like a pro, and crossing home, to score his own run just ahead of the staggering runner.

Protests erupted from the outfield. "Dogs only count as half a run!" As if on cue, Duke squatted behind the dugout to offer a pungent response.

Gambier community softball is nothing if not fun, and this season was funnier than most. Under Barry's saintly leadership, the softball crew assembled each Wednesday evening to sculpt the classic pick-up softball experience: a ballyard carnival with no emphasis on winning (not even keeping score), no choosing sides except by count-off ("all the ones in the field, twos bat first"), and no cussing, yelling, or finger-pointing except for comic relief.

The young, old, and in-between, the talented and otherwise-talented, the tall and short, fast and slow, the terminally degreed and the aspirants: all competed without competing, all played to win with no possibility of losing. It was graceful, awkward, strenuous, and easy. Injuries to body and spirit tend to happen only when the going gets too serious.

Seriousness never had much of a chance this summer. The national game's bare outlines served purely as approximate choreography. The rest was improvised, with perfection provided by the occasional day that was simply dazzling-blue sky, slanting sun, kids watering the dogs with squeeze bottles. Elsewhere the game is played for blood lust and lucre by large men. Here, we're all children, playing for the simple fact of a ball, a bat, a glove and some love.

As we scatter now into seriousness, let me note that this summer was perhaps the best in recent community softball history. I'll remember: the fine plays by Joel and Barry; Kim's incomparably comic body language, in all directions at once; finely wrought running narrative from all three Erics; Paula's cameo appearance, not missing a beat from two seasons ago; Casey and Katie's indefatigable cheerfulness; Grace's grace; Barbara's smile and sore hamstrings; Damon's two glorious running catches with Josh's "gi-normous"mitt (expertly rubbed with magic magnetic oil and thus able to catch everything); Jim's sure hands and ripping swing; and my own passage, trying to jump for a soft line drive and finding myself anchored to earth by O.L.D. Syndrome as the big ball slowly floated by, mocking me with its own laced grin.

Not to challenge Reed Browning, whose new book highlights 1924 as baseball's greatest season ever, but Muddy Ruel was never outrun by a dog to score a run and a half. That feat we have witnessed, and more, on an Elysian field not far from here, where grass grows, wind blows, sun graces earth, and we make our own sort of mark.