Specifically, my boyfriend's second cousin once removed, of all people, had invited us to, of all things, a baseball game.
I mean it IS allegedly a big deal to go to a Yankees game as they are allegedly a better team than the Mets, and I AM grateful that the experience was sponsored (can't imagine how I would have reacted if the bf had asked me to pay out of pocket). And it WAS an experience.
I don't know if I've made it obvious yet, but I don't know anything about baseball or the Yankees. I insisted that bf and I eat dinner beforehand, because if baseball stadiums are anything like movie theaters, then I knew it was going to be a racket.
As it turned out, it wasn't a racket - it was an absolutely horrific scam. I'm pretty sure a single beer was something like $17.
Anyway, we filed in (I had worn a navy shirt with stripes which happened to be the pattern of the Yankees, which I felt pretty proud about) and sat in our little seats high above the diamond or whatever. It was in this time, before the game started, that I learned that the guy who stands behind the batter is actually pretty important and not just the ball-catching gofer. Like I thought he played an equivalent role as the parent in a kids' soccer game who runs and gets the soccer ball when it goes out of bounds.
Oh, also: the people we were playing against were the Astros. From Texas. Houston? I don't really know.
So, armed with plenty of knowledge about innings and balls and whatnot, I was feeling pretty good about things when the newscaster started screaming "it's... TANAKA TIME." It was all very exciting. I think in that moment I decided that there would probably be very little better than being an announcer who got to scream fun slogans at an audience going crazy.
The craziness ended pretty abruptly when absolutely nothing happened in the first... I forget exactly how many but it was a lot... innings. You could feel the audience starting to get a little restless. Two hours in, with zero home runs and another sluggish outfield to infield change, the audience started murmuring and jostling about something.
It was a bird. I kid you not, a hawk on some pole on our side of the field was garnering more attention than the game was. People started taking out their phones and getting excited about this bird.
And then, as if it couldn't get worse, the entire big screen which had been previously focused on the players missing another ball or making some attempt at the bases started filming the bird. I couldn't believe it. As the audience ooh-ed and ah-ed I was trying to sort out how I felt about all this.
See, I had thought that these people had paid money to be entertained by baseball for hours on end, but as it turns out they can be entertained by anything for hours on end. They were entertained by random people kissing (quickly). They were entertained by random people dancing (badly). They were entertained by little kids (looking bored) on their parents' shoulders. And they were entertained by a BIRD. On a POLE. Shouldn't a sport be interesting enough to watch in its entirety if you're going to pay to see it live?? What I couldn't see was: why is baseball this boring??
Near the end of the game, when people started making home runs, it got a little more exciting. But by the time hour four was rolling around and we were approaching the last inning, the game was tied up.
Please. I thought. Please, someone do a home run so I can go home.
Behind me, The Worst Kid in The World was whining to his parents, who had just dropped the bomb on him that they were going to leave before the game ended to make the next train back and avoid the rush. I would have tried to convince bf to do the same, but it seemed like his second cousin once removed was interested to stay through the end. Bad form to up and leave.
"No!" TWKITW screamed. "I don't want to go home! I want to watch the rest of the game! You can't make me!"
I slumped in my seat and tried to cover my ears. Please. I thought. Someone hit the ball.
"I hope nobody hits the ball and it goes overtime! I hope we miss our train!"
Stupid kid. I thought. God, please listen to me instead. Please put me out of my misery.
Nobody was hitting the ball. TWKITW screamed in triumph when the inning ended and the game was still tied up. I would have cried, but I was as dehydrated as a camel's tongue. We had finished our water bottle long ago and I wasn't willing to spend $10 on more. The guy across the row had been methodically shelling peanuts and depositing them around his feet for all four hours, and the sound of the peanuts being cracked was now gunfire to my brain. He looked like he was sitting in kitty litter.
Please, please let anyone win. It can be the orange team. Let's go home.
Finally, the Yankees (TANAKA TIME) hit a home run. The game was over.
The stadium was well-designed enough to handle the hoard of people going to the subways, and if you stuck out your elbows and kept your cool, then it was bearable to reach the subways, which had a couple of empty trains lined up back to back to take the hoard back to Manhattan.
Bf and I got to the train when it was still empty and watch it quickly fill up with navy and white stripes.
"WE WON!!! NEW YOOOORK! YAASS!" One guy who had clearly indulged in too many $17 beers was celebrating the Yankee victory. It was hard not to be enthusiastic, but I was bone tired. It was near midnight, and past my bedtime.
But we won!
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| We join the masses at the game. |
