Yonkers v. Crossover
The Virginia cat Virginia missed me enough to draw blood on first greeting and the little beads of blood on my hand are testament to her devotion to me. I spank her lightly on her right haunch which is something she actually likes so it's not really punishment. She listens attentively and without blinking to my brief recitation of Roman adventures and then retires to her cardboard box. I don't tell her about the cats of Palermo. She crowds me on the bed now and I pet her when I tire of the keyboard.
Three days in New York after finishing the Italy trip with three days in Rome and I am a little disoriented by being able to understand what people are saying and wishing to some degree that I could not. Also I find it harder to understand the architecture in New York so I wander off on Saturday in search of something to relate to and instead of crossing the Williamsburg Bridge stop at the East River. Walking back and forth looking for a spot to own I pause at a little league baseball game and end up staying for the double header. The boys are twelve or thirteen I think or maybe a little older. There is a little league football being played on a field that takes up part of the baseball outfield and periodically the game is stopped while eight and nine year olds line up for third and long. I stand mostly, to the right of home plate and watch a Chinese kid for the Yonkers team throw slow looping curve balls with fairly decent accuracy. I was rooting against him though as the prevailing sun and dust storms caused me to move over and by default root for the Crossover Phenoms.
I was like a scout as far as anyone was concerned and with my uncanny understanding of the game and ability to recognize talent there hung in the air the possibility of some young player being drafted into a better league. This was a shared fantasy (with little or no factual basis) that was however shattered when tossing a ball back to a kid practicing off in the grass, my arm, surely constricted by the wide padded straps of the small backpack I wore, conspired against all fantasy and the ball went several feet short and to the left of its target. Perhaps the worst throw of my life and one that brought back memories of my own little league career, a mediocre one at best. I wandered off shortly after that, all dreams on hold for the time being, and walking back up Houston instead of Delancey I was again dismayed by the prevalent lack of architectural integrity.
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