Under the warm summer’s sun on a vacant lot in northern Minnesota, my boyhood friends and I whiled away the days of June, July, and August playing baseball.
Looking back on those days, I remember most the simplicity of it all.
Uniforms consisted of faded blue jeans, canvas converse tennis shoes, and white t-shirts crudely emblazoned with our names, numbers and team logo–each handwritten with a black dry marker by the only kid on the block who got an S in Miss Ihli’s spelling class.
There were no bases–I mean of course there were bases; just not the kind you’d see now. In fact, the bags at Everson’s field strangely resembled plastic lids that came from one-gallon Monarch Ice Cream pails–except for home plate of course; that we stole from the softball diamonds at SunnyBrook Campground out on Highway 71 during an overnight camp-out.
Our gloves were, more often than not, of the hand-me-down variety. And by the end of summer season, our bats had been broken more than once–but a few finishing nails and some electrical tape restored even the worst piece of lumber into the magic wand it once was.
But it was the backstop at Everson’s field that I remember most. That was the real deal–few neighborhood fields had such a treasure. It gave the field that aura of professionalism that only a 12-year-old boy could groove on.
A short time ago, I happened upon a baseball field in south central Nebraska that reminded me of Everson’s field. As I stood on that long-forgotten still vacant lot, the memories of my childhood came rushing back.
I am convinced there will never be another time in my life like those summers in northern Minnesota.
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