Playing Ball...again

When my sweetie and I left town in September of 1983 to start our new life together, it never really occurred to me that my softball-playing days might be over. But then I got pregnant with Bossy, my sweetie withdrew from school, and I had that horrible Arctic Circle job. After that we gathered everything up and moved back to my hometown.

We weren't admitting defeat, we simply had a new plan. My sweetie had taken an electronics class and he was way more excited about it than he was about chemistry. Snow College had just started a new program for electronic technicians...but wait, this is a story about playing ball. I will tell you this other one later.

So we moved back to Ephraim just in time for softball season and even though I was about 5 months pregnant, I was feeling decidedly better. Unfortunately, the ladies on my team were not expecting me back and they had already replaced me at shortstop. I think if I hadn't been pregnant and awkward, they would have given me my old spot, but "as a protection" for me, they put me on second base.

Not that I really wanted or needed protection, my sweetie still talks about later in the season when I slid into home. I was just past seven months along. (Pretty sure I wouldn't do that now.)  In spite of the craziness, the season ended without any significant injuries and Bossy was born the first part of November.

We were still in Ephraim when softball season started up in the spring of 1985. One more season was way more than I had hoped for! Bossy was getting bigger and as the weather warmed up, my sweetie started bringing her to the ball field to watch me play. The playground was close by so sometimes he headed there and sometimes he just sat with her on a blanket.

One day my team was on the field. It was the second or third inning and I don't recall the score. Suddenly I glanced over at my sweetie. He had forgotten the blanket and my little Bossy was chewing on a mouthful of dirt and grass. Well I couldn't have that! I called an informal timeout and marched down the third baseline. My older and somewhat wiser friends were laughing at me from the in-field. Even the other team was laughing! Did all of these ladies let their sweet precious babies eat dirt?

I quickly wiped out her mouth and trotted back to my place. "Sorry!" I called rather self-righteously as I waved to the umpire. Even he was sniggering. I thought I was doing the right thing...but I guess stopping the game over a little dirt was a tad obsessive. Pretty sure I wouldn't do that now...