Your Mental Wealth

In one of my previous lives I coached high school baseball. Nearly two decades. Actually, I lived baseball. I used to say that I was one of those people who worked in a school system so that I would be allowed to coach. My obsession (which is another story) with having good teams and doing good things for the athletes I was privileged to work with was something to behold. We were pretty successful over the years.

Some of my old players from the ‘60’s, 70’s and 80’s organized an annual alumni game a few years back and had invited me to come, but I had never been able to arrange to go. This past summer I made it.

Surprisingly, I found myself feeling a little more than a little bit apprehensive about walking into a world I had walked out of some 25 years ago. What do I say? What does an ‘honorary’ coach for the game do? When one coaches, I would guess there would be as many people who ended up disliking me as liked me. How do I deal with that? (The latter question was dealt with, I guess, by none of them showing up).

When I arrived at the field, all of those questions and concerns vanished as I immediately saw some folks who had been an important part of that era and began chatting with them. Like riding a bicycle, some things come back quickly.

Of course all of these “young men” had now grown in to teachers, media moguls, producers, carpenters, electricians, laborers, doctors, nurses, attorneys, dad’s, step-dads, uncles, ministers, missionaries, business owners, and some even into retirees with grandchildren!!!!!!! I was like a sponge, soaking up all the information about who, what, when, and where in their lives. How about the people who weren’t there? “What do you know of Dave? Whatever happened to Joe, John, Mike, Ron, Dan, Mike…….?

As the game progressed, I found it amazing that the very same unconscious nervous habits and “rituals” that they had when they were 16, 17, and 18, still showed up these many years and decades later as they were pitching, catching, hitting and playing catch. Jon wiggling his fingers on the bat between pitches, Keith smoothing the dirt in front of him with his foot at short stop before each pitch, brothers Gary, Mike and Greg doing their thing on the mound, Jeff tugging at his hat and nodding his head to the catcher before each pitch. I even found myself being careful to not step on a chalked line (which is considered bad luck) as I maneuvered around the field.

The obligatory photos were taken and the game began. It started out as just a fun time, but it wasn’t long before the competitive fires began burning again. In fact the scheduled game ended in a tie. Well, they couldn’t let that happen and the game went into extra innings, as there HAD to be a winner).

I found myself chatting with many of the guys on the bench. We reminisced about the fun times. The practical jokes. Replaying the games we should have won. The close calls. Then I started to get filled in on what had happened in their lives over the last 20-30 years. There were some amazingly great things that had happened during that time period. So many things to celebrate and I was amazed by what they had achieved.

After the initial excitement of seeing each other again and catching up a little bit, “The Wall” began to make its presence known. I had always had a close relationship with my player’s parents and they supported me and the team in some extraordinary ways. I was interested in how they were doing too.

“How is your Dad doing”? I asked one of my all-time favorite players. A pained look crossed his face, his eyes moved quickly to the ground and he said, “Well, I am losing my dad. I took him out for a ride last week and the next day he asked my mom who that man was who drove him around yesterday”.

To another, “And your Dad?” Well, he had a series of strokes a few years ago and now he is totally bedridden needing 24-hour a day care.

And yours? “Dad and Mom both got sick last year about the same time, ended up in intensive care in two different hospitals. Dad died one day and Mom died the next”

“I lost my Dad to a heart attack”, “Mom died of cancer a couple of years ago”.

Then to conversations about their fellow players who weren’t there. “Jack committed suicide”, “Bill is a now a fugitive”.

One of the best players and young men who ever played for us came up and started talking. As he approached I noticed he was limping. He shared with me that a medical condition had gotten out of control and one of his legs had been amputated. That tragedy had been compounded recently by the murder of his son.

The rest of the day was filled with the sweet and bitter stories of lives lived/lives lost, plans realized/ plans changed, successes/losses.

The words of a line in the musical “Fiddler on the Roof” came back to me as I listened that day. A line when one of the main characters is asked about his life and he responds “I have the whole catastrophe”. Meaning he had a wife, children, work, landlord, happiness, sadness, joy, loss, love, pain, understanding, being misunderstood…and everything else humans are capable of experiencing simply because they are alive.

I was also reminded that in the Eastern traditions there is a teaching that if we listen carefully, no matter where we are or what we are doing, there is in the background a waterfall of grief, loss, and sadness. So, it should never come as a surprise when it comes into our awareness. But rather, it should serve as motivation to live our lives fully and with purpose.

This day also reminded of the story I was told of the Yaqui tribe, whose ancestral home is in northern Mexico. They believe that death sits on our left shoulder, waiting for the moment to claim us. It is said that sometimes if we look quickly, we can sometimes see its shadow.

The gift in knowing about the waterfall and the left shoulder is so that we can strive to live each day fully, with appreciation, gratefulness, humility, purpose and without regret. My remembering these two “teachings” helped me treasure this very special day.