The Kickball Diaries: A brand new season

Week 1. Kitshickers vs Rehab's for Quitters
Game Time: 9/4/2008, 7:20pm
Game Conditions: not nearly as hot as it could have been, but still dang hot.
Result: T 4-4
Record: 0-0-1

We showed up with socks, not just any socks, but matching socks. And we were 100% compliant with the socks - until they began to get too hot, and started cutting off the circulation of our particularly big-calf-muscle teammates. But even then, they had the socks just pushed down. We showed up with a soundtrack, 11 songs of pure kickball inspiring rock. Unfortunately, we were unable to play our soundtrack - and thus, the beginning of our decline.

We took the field first, and I was out in my right field spot. After some pre-game catching practice from FA, the rest of the outfield (BK, and myself) were ready. "get under it" "get behind it" "use both arms" "if you can't catch it set it for yourself" "use your chest" These were the helpful tips running through my head. The other team quickly scored 3 runs. And it looked like we were off to a rough start. But, our first turn at bat, and we answered back with 3 runs. I made it on base this inning, but got thrown out while running to second. Darn.

Our second time out in the field and it was like a new ball game. Somewhere in the 5th inning I kicked the ball in my usual fashion, low and not towards first. In this instance we had the bases loaded, so I tried to aim away from third as well. I managed that, it went somewhere towards 2nd, and that runner was out. But, I was safe at first, and R'OD was safely home. And we're up, 4-3.

We took the field for the final inning, ahead, and got two quick outs. Two strikes into the third out R'OD turns to me from first and says "One strike away". R'OD being a sox diehard like myself should know better. They kicked us around a bit, we made some silly plays, and they managed another run before we got another out. So we go up to kick the last time, tied for the billionth time in our life, wanting to do nothing but NOT tie. And we came up short.

All in all, the first game of the season wasn't a total disaster - I mean, after our perfectly 500 season in the spring yet another tie is like nails on a chalkboard. But, we did not get crushed, we held our own, and lost it tragically right at the end.