Updated: A Bold Challenge from Some Young Guns

Quite frankly, I was a little surprised.

It’s not every day that a 16-year-old girl talks trash with a 55-year-old man, but the message in Amber Ahronian’s email was quite clear: Mudville had better watch out.

Amber is a member of the Ruby Slippers & Flying Monkeys, a team of active community youths who are participating in this year’s Relay for Life fundraiser for the American Cancer Society on June 11-12 at Ashland High. I am "Choo-Choo," captain of the world famous Mudville Base Ball Club.

Amber and her “team” have challenged us to a vintage base ball game to help raise money for the fundraiser. The game will be played Sunday, May 22 at Donation will be requested, with refreshments available.

Little does young Amber understand the task she is undertaking. The Mudville Base Ball Club, newly-enshrined at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY — OK, so they only kept our scorebook —, is fresh off a 2010 campaign that took us across the country and into the hearts of an American public anxious to rediscover the values that made this country great. Little does she know about the Massachusetts Rules of 1858, the edicts that will guide our play, which include the “plugging” of runners for outs. Hardly can she comprehend the “sting” that accompanies both said “plugging” and her team’s anticipated public humiliation.

The fun begins at 1 p.m., and all funds raised are for a great cause.  Please come out and support the Ruby Slippers, and help Amber and her team take a big swing at curing cancer.

A LONG WAY FROM HOME

It’s true that it’s a long way from Tipperary to the fighting fields of France, but even Claude Choules would have been impressed with Bobby Blair, and the degree to which his influence extends.

Choules was a member of the British Royal Navy and the last surviving combat veteran of World War I. His death last week at the age of 110 closed the book on the stories of the more than 70 million military personnel who participated in the “war to end all wars.”

Blair is the personable Mayor of Mudville, and widely known for his efforts on behalf of his fellow veterans. And while it is indeed a long way from Tipperary to The Somme, even the crustiest Tommy would have to agree that it pales in comparison to the distance between Mudville and Kinvara, Ireland. Indeed, the eastward directional sign adjacent to the Mayor’s garden notes that distance as 3033 miles, and it was in that direction I recently traveled to confirm reports related to The Mayor and his world.

Thus, it was on the day that Choules died that I found myself at Logan Airport boarding an Aer Lingus flight to Shannon. The next day, I was in Kinvara. I knew that it was in this area that The Mayor once owned a home. I found the village typical of many I had seen as my party traveled northward toward Galway Bay, with nearby castles, stately churches, attractive row houses and pubs.

Arriving just before 5 p.m. and feeling a little dry from our travels, we decided to visit one of these pubs, Connollys, for some quick refreshment. We were disappointed to discover that the establishment adhered to a less than stringent opening schedule, and the doors were locked tight. My wife peered through a window, seeking any form of human life that might allow us to gain entry, when she saw that the Mayor had indeed been there. Nailed into the rafters, claiming equal space with license plates from around the world, was one inscribed “Mudville - Alive and Well - Holliston, Ma.”

Delighted with this find, we returned to the car and resumed our travels; still thirsty, but satisfied to learn that when one looks through the right window, it can often lead to home.