Anything you can do, I can do better

Ryan Howard fields ground balls. (Photo credit to Associated Press)

Michael can do that, too.

What Michael can learn from Jim Bouton

Jim Bouton

I cried when I finished reading "Ball Four." I was 29 years old when I finally read Jim Bouton's controversial, honest and beautiful memoir and the last line of that book is my favorite sentence in the English language.
Yes, it's better that "Play ball," at least to me, because it's the most truthful thing I've ever read.

"You see, you spend a good piece of your life gripping a baseball and in the end it turns out it was the other way around all the time."

 I'm not going to overanalyse this passage, other than to say it's so simple. There is no high-flying rhetoric, just honesty. Something that's in short supply these days. Yes, the sentence seems corny, but when Jim Bouton ended his book - a memoir that peeled back the cover of Major League Baseball and showed its seedy underside - you realize how much a simple game can mean to a man who is portrayed as being so jaded.

I thought about this passage the other day as I was holding Michael. I guess it turned out it was the other way around.

Guys days in

When Mom is away the boys will play.
Molly is spending the night in Chambersburg to see our friend in a play. Then she's spending the evening at The Gary Owen in Gettysburg. Tomorrow and Sunday she's working at Kays.
That means Michael and I get more bonding time. (I'll finish posting the diaries from Vacation with Michael tomorrow)
Here's our agenda for the next two days:

Vacation With Michael Day 10: Road Trip

We spent Friday on the road, heading up to Waverly, N.Y., Molly's hometown.
The trip always takes longer than we expect.
Normally it takes us longer to leave.
While we got out a bit late this time, it wasn't hours late like normal.
This time, we were sidetracked by The Atomic Baby.
We stopped in Scranton - at my sister's - midway. Making a rest stop at any of my sisters' or my parents' is perfect. Clean bathrooms, clean place to change Michael, and a quick visit. We try to keep it under half an hour. That's about how long it would be if we stopped for dinner mid trip. And we usually eat during our break.
Well Michael went thermonuclear. He rarely does this, but something crawled up his three-month-old arse and we spent a good 20 minutes trying to calm him down.

Vacation With Michael Day 9: Under Pressure

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We've already established that I'm trying to get Michael to like the same music I do.
Well, we might have finally found common ground.
My son loves Queen.
The boy had barely responded to any of the other music I played, though he seems to enjoy when others sing Johnny Cash Songs.
Then came Freddie Mercury and the boys of Queen.
He's like his old man. I never would have called Queen my favorite band - that title has pretty much always belonged to U2 (since college) or the Creedence Clearwater Revival (about three of my four high school years).
But Queen has always sounded so different to me. Bit of opera, lot of rock, a sprinkling of the blues, a dash of Motown and a pinch of R & B.
My first recollection of Queen isn't "We Will Rock You," "We are the Champions" or "Bohemian Rhapsody." It's "Another One Bites the Dust."
I remember being at a Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Red Barons game when I was growing up and music played after a Red Baron struck out. My brothers-in-law Tom and Gene were with me. They laughed at the music.
I asked them why. They told me it was the song "Another One Bites the Dust."

Vacation with Michael Day 8: Talking with grandma

We've got a pretty good routine going. Michael and I get up around 8 or 9 every morning. We have breakfast, watch a little "Law and Order" or a documentary from Netflix.
Sometime later, I call my mom and put it on speaker phone. My parents haven't gotten to see Michael often. They're getting on in years and don't like to travel. At least that's what they say about visiting four of their five children. Cough, cough.
 So these conversations have meant a lot. I put the phone on speaker and my mother will say, "Baby" and Michael will make some noises. Part of me wants to buy my parents an iPad so they can Facetime or skype with him. The rest of me, however, knows they won't download skype or use the iPhone so it wouldn't be worth it. Then the rest of me remembers I'm a journalist. So I don't make enough to buy my parents an iPad.
Soundtrack for Day 8: Paul Simon's Graceland

Vacation with Michael Day 7: Cashing in

During my two-week vacation with Michael, I tried to introduce Michael to different musicians I enjoy. Part of it's because I hope we'll have something in common someday. Part of it is because it just makes the day enjoyable to listen to the music I like. I spent the first day playing Billy Joel. I moved on to U2, Stevie Wonder and so on.
Looking back, I noticed it shows the progression of my taste in music. I grew up buying up every Billy Joel song I could find. My first CD was "An Innocent Man." It's still one of my favorite albums.
While I still consider the Piano Man to be one of my favorite musicians, he's taken a back seat over the years to U2.
The fourth day of our vacation saw us take a trip to State College, which meant our soundtrack for the day was the Penn State Blue Band.
Today we listened to Johnny Cash. I never really listened to him until I got to college. My roomate Dave had a couple of Cash's songs on his computer and that planted the seeds. Molly, however, really likes Johnny Cash and June Carter, so we've picked up a bunch of CDs and records over the years.

Vacation Day 6: Blow it out your nose

And on the sixth day, Michael died. Well, that's what I thought was happening. Michael woke up around 8:30 Tuesday morning, which meant I woke up around 8:35. After playing for a little bit, he seemed hungry. Eating his hands, crying loudly. So I grabbed a bottle of milk, warmed it up and proceeded to feed. While Mike ate, I turned on "Law & Order: SVU" on Netflix. That's our established routine. The bottle warms up during the cold opening. Then I sit down with Michael as the opening credits start. Sometimes, if I time it right, the "Boom boom" accompanies the his burps. So during our feeding on Tuesday, Michael must have been filled to the brim. In the middle of feeding, he coughed once, gagged and did the most disgusting thing I've ever seen a human do. He spit up. But it wasn't a regular spit up. Milk came out his mouth and his nose. And here's where it gets nasty. The milk that came out his nose went into his mouth. Dad gagged. But the difference between adult and child is a simple one. Liquid did not come out my nose, and if it had, I would not have swallowed it. Tuesday's soundtrack: Crosby, Stills and Nash.

Vacation Day 5: My son, the nudist

It's going to be a while before I find out whether or not Michael is left-handed or right-handed. It's going to be even longer before Molly and I learn whether he is a power hitter or slap-hitting speedster.
One thing we already know is that he loves to be nude.
Molly had warned me about this a while ago, but it wasn't until Monday, while listening to some Bruce Springsteen, that I truly understood.
When Michael has cried, it usually meant one of three things:  he was hungry, he needed to be changed, he was tired.
The tired cry just doesn't have his heart in it.
The changing cry is high-pitched.
The hungry cry builds slowly and sounds more angry.
On Monday, I couldn't figure out why Michael was crying. I tried to feed him. Nothing.
He was too animated to be tired. So I plopped him down on the changing table.
That's when things got interesting.

Vacation with Michael Day 4: Happy Valley

Michael and I on a blustery day in Happy Valley.

Sunday might have been the most emotional day for me since Michael's birth.
We took Michael to State College for the first time.
If you know me, you know what Penn State means to me. It's not just a football team or a school. It's home. My father taught electrical engineering and coached basketball at one of the branch campuses, Penn State Worthington-Scranton. My mother worked there. I played baseball there. I was student government president. I can remember walking around that campus in Dunmore when I was just a child. I'd hide out in my dad's office, pretending to be a Ghostbuster, while he taught classes.

That's me, kneeling fifth from the left.

As for University Park, I think my earliest memory is from a trip there. I vaguely remember going to my sister Mary Jo's apartment. I was three or four when Mary Jo graduated, so this memory is pretty early. I'm pretty sure I remember my sister Betsy being there, too.  I wanted something to drink and Mary Jo gave me this glass filled with a dark liquid. She told me it was iced tea. I remember saying I didn't know what that was and asking if they were sure they didn't have apple juice.
I remember not liking the tea. It's my first memory of anything bitter.
Now, I'm practically addicted to iced tea.
I have similar memories of visiting all of my siblings while they were students at Penn State.
It's where I first saw an R-rated movie ("A Few Good Men" with my brother Mike), where I first met my sister-in-law Patty (I transformed into a car upon the introduction. Ert-eet-ert-eet-ert), where I got "The talk."
And then I went to school there, gaining some of the best friends anyone could ask for.
It's not just the place where I grew up. To myself, and others like me, it really was the safest place on earth.
That's why the past year has been so devastating.


(Pat's Note: If you don't want to read about my thoughts on the scandal, but do want to read about our trip, skip to the next page)

It's hard to imagine, but that's me third from the right, in the sweater.

One of my other earliest memories is of looking up at my father. We're in the stands at Beaver Stadium and he's peering through binoculars. He's telling me about the man who patrols Penn State's sidelines, Joseph Vincent Paterno. When your father looks up to someone, that can only mean one thing: That person must be a god or at least close to it.
I have one other important memory of my father and Penn State from my childhood. It's the memory that will mean the most to me when he's gone.
I'm about six or seven. I'm looking down on my father - when does any six year old get to do that? - from a small tree in a parking lot near one of the dorms at Penn State. Dad's sipping a coffee and reading a book. I'm out on a branch playing with some Transformers. I watch as my father looks for me and notices I'm not there. He says my name. I stay quiet and watch as he walks around looking for me. I'm too innocent to realize how much I might be scaring my father. When he finally finds me, he doesn't yell at me. He laughs. I remember feeling very loved then as he rubbed my head.
Shortly after Molly told me we were having a baby, the Sandusky news broke.
I remembered interviewing Sandusky and him having his arm around me as we talked. I remembered how my father had even spoken more highly of Sandusky than Paterno at times.
While the news bothered me greatly, my love for the school stayed strong.
I used to joke that my child could be a Democrat or Republican, a Mets fan or Phillies fan, but would have to be either a Penn State fan or go to Penn State. My school would somehow be my child's school.
But as football season came near, I couldn't really get into it.
We scheduled a baby shower the day of a game. I didn't even realize it. I always checked the Penn State schedule. Stuff like that wouldn't have happened in previous seasons.
Part of me realized this was going to be bigger than Sandusky.
Then the charges were filed. It was so much worse than I could have imagined. Two Penn State officials were charged with perjury. A coach claimed to have seen an assault. Paterno had been told.
And Jerry Sandusky had been in the football facilities months after Paterno had testified. He - and other Penn State officials - knew what his former assistant was accused of. They knew he was a danger to children and the program. Yet, Sandusky was allowed in the buildings.
I wanted to vomit.
I thought about loyalty.
A big part of me said, "Joe couldn't have known. Defend him."
But a bigger part of me said some things mattered more.
Those children, for one thing.
I also realized that I had to be loyal to the beliefs and ideals that Penn State, Paterno and my father had taught me. Doing more than what's expected, doing the right thing, protecting the defenseless.
Those ideals will always be more important than any man or institution.
Now, I didn't like the way Paterno was fired, but I agreed with the decision.
And, no, I don't think the media, the board of trustees or the scandal killed Paterno.
He might have died with a broken heart, but cancer killed him.

But Coach Paterno will always be more to me than this scandal.
He's a coach who never forgot he was also a representative of a school. Scholastics were so important to him he helped make that small school one of the brightest beacons of light in this state.
He's a man who dedicated time and money to the Special Olympics.
And yet, I couldn't help but feel the man who always seemed to do more, hadn't done enough.

Vacation Day 3: A wonderful afternoon

Today was a very special day for me.
I watched a live baseball game with my son for the first time.
We were playing in Michael's bed room. I had just changed him and he was singing along to Stevie Wonder songs when I saw a Facebook post from Brian Misiura, "Phillies vs. Yankees - Baseball is back!"
I quickly dressed Michael and changed out of my New Oxford Rays shirt.
We turned on the game in the second inning.
Aside from a nap during a couple of commercials and the seventh inning, Michael watched the entire game.
I gave him some advice.
"Michael, if the guy in front of you walks on pitches that are nowhere near the strike zone, don't swing at the first pitch." And, "Michael, if you just walked a guy and the next batter swings at a ball, you thank him. He's about to get out."
But the biggest advice I gave him was this:
"No matter what, kiddo, it's a game. Don't forget that. Whether you're playing T-ball or in the Big Leagues, it's just a game. You're supposed to have fun. I'm not going to lie. It's, mentally, the hardest game in the world. And it will break your heart more than any girl. But it can bring you a ton of joy. If I could spend an afternoon shagging fly balls hit by your grandfather, I would. If I could play catch with your cousins. Riding the bus with teammates to a game. Those are the special moments you'll take with you for ever. The feeling of a well-struck ball flying off your bat. It all boils down to having fun."

Vacation Day 2: U2 and the Promise of Spring

Seven months ago, Michael was growing inside Molly as she and I attended a U2 concert at Soldier field in Chicago.
It was a beautiful day.
The band was fantastic, Molly was beautiful and my heart was light. Two or three times, she'd put her hands around her belly and say, "Do you hear the music, baby?" Then I would tear up.
It was a nice trip, seeing Molly's brother Jude and his girlfriend Nicole. It was our third trip to the windy city and made all the more enjoyable because Molly's mom came with us. (It was great sharing driving duties.) We even went on a tour of Wrigley Field.
But as much as I love Wrigley Field (It's my favorite Major League Stadium), that concert meant the world to me.

What Michael can learn from Joe DiMaggio

It's not the triple crowns, MVP awards or World Series rings that really impress you. When it comes to Joe DiMaggio, you're awed by the grace and elegance. First, the grace. There's a story that's often told about The Great DiMaggio and his outlook at how ballplayers should represent themselves. You have to hope it's not an embellishment. DiMaggio is supposedly getting on in years, when a young player asked him why he hustled in a meaningless game. The Hall of Famer is reported to have responded, "Because there is always some kid who may be seeing me for the first time. I owe him my best." Now, the elegance. DiMaggio was married to Marilyn Monroe for just nine months when they divorced. (Can anyone be married to Marilyn Monroe for "just" any amount of time?) Yet, when Monroe died, DiMaggio ordered fresh roses be put on her grave every week.

Vacation Day 1: Billy Joel and the diaper dandy

For the first time since college, I have two weeks off. I'm going to spend this time with Michael. I've been looking forward to this since before he was born. It's pretty much just going to be the two us on weekdays.
His mom is going back to work and when my vacation comes to an end, he's going to be heading off to daycare.

Molly is pretty torn up. She's been at his side for the entirety of the first three months of life.

Michael, of course, didn't miss a beat.

It makes you realize how adaptable babies are.

Things went pretty well for the first day.

Michael spent much of the day listening to dad's collection of Billy Joel albums. He didn't complain; but he didn't really have a choice.

Again, it just goes to show how adaptable babies are.

Dads, on the other hand, are not as adaptable.