I Never Thought This Story Would Have a Happy Ending

I hate softball. Hate, hate, hate it. Or at least, I thought I did.

It all started out fine. I liked t-ball. I never struck out when the ball was sitting on a stick on home plate, and I even have some fuzzy memories of feeling good when I managed to catch the ball. Overall, a positive experience.

From there, I moved on to slowpitch. I still enjoyed myself, mostly because I was pretty good. The only bad time came in third grade, when I was running the bases without a helmet and got smacked in the face by a wild throw. I cried a little, and my dad took me to the emergency room, but it wasn't that bad. My mom got me a milkshake, and by the time the doctor saw me, I felt pretty good. I even exaggerated a little when he asked me how painful it was so he wouldn't feel like he was wasting his time on me. I got an attention-getting black eye, a good story, and a milkshake. Not too shabby.

Now, my father maintains that this is why my hatred for the sport smolders so, and is so prone to erupting at the slightest mention of my softball days. He is wrong. It actually stems from the years I played fastpitch, or (as I refer to them inside my head) The Nightmare Years. Allow me to elaborate.

The speed was the first issue. "Fastpitch" is neither a misnomer nor an exaggeration. The ball no longer arced toward me with the same innocent trajectory as a rainbow. No, now it had all the velocity and lack of control of an adolescent cheetah. I was terrified, but I took a swing occasionally. It was usually in my best interest not to, though, because I was really small back then, which led to an even smaller strike zone. The coaches had a predictable, easy-to-translate chorus of praise.

"Good cut, good cut!"  - This was when I swung and missed.

"Good eye, good eye!"  - For either a ball or a walk. This was the most common phrase.

"Good contact, good contact!" - When I hit a foul ball, thus making contact with the ball.

"Good effort, good effort!" -  Signaling a strikeout. The second most common phrase.

Any time I managed to hit the ball into fair territory, the coaches were usually too surprised to do anything for a few seconds before they collected themselves and yelled, "Run! Run!"

Batting was actually not the worst part. After a few moments of abject terror, it was all over, and I could retreat to either the safety of the dugout or first base. Fielding wasn't too bad either because I could throw and catch with impressive mediocrity.

No, the tears and trauma all came at home. Somehow, as soon as I moved up into fastpitch, my dad got the idea that I should be a pitcher. I agreed, mostly because I was young and stupid and had no idea what being a pitcher would entail.

It entailed practicing a lot in my backyard. Now, I was not a very fast pitcher; I had little arms and little to no upper body strength. So I think my dad figured that I could still be really good, as long as I had some kind of super control over the ball. I had no kind of control at all over the ball, and thus usually felt frustrated at best. 

But more often, I cried a lot, even as I still tried to get the stupid ball over the stupid plate. I think that might be the worst part of it all - that I never really improved. My best was heartbreakingly average. And I didn't know how to get better, beyond doing the same things I was already doing, but more.

Which was bad.

Also, I don't think my dad was exactly sure how to a) get me to stop crying (which was bad for us both) and b) get me to throw the ball with any kind of consistency. Well, he did have one way, which was to say "Release point!" a lot. This implied that I was releasing the ball at the wrong point, which I knew I was doing, and did not know how to stop doing.

My brother was present for all of this, and he thinks it's really funny. In fact, sometimes for fun he'll yell "Release point!" just so he can see me cringe instinctively. We're both pretty sure that my dad views my softball days through rose-colored glasses, whereas I just try to shut my eyes to the whole thing so that way I don't have to think about good efforts or release points at all.

But my eyes were sort of forced open this week when we started the softball unit in my gym class. I thought of my history with the sport and shuddered. But then we actually started to play. Actually, we were just warming up, throwing the ball back and forth. It was then that my ego started to grow. Just because I could throw and catch the ball.

I realized that, even though for a softball player I'm not even a little bit good, compared to the girls in my gym class, I belong in the movie "A League of Their Own." I liked feeling superior to these people. "Really? You're not comfortable using a baseball glove? What have you been doing for the last sixteen years, not playing softball?"

It was then that I realized what my role was, all those years ago, when I hated, hated, hated softball. I wasn't supposed to be a hitter or a pitcher or a fielder. I just needed to be there, someone for the other girls to feel superior to. Because man, it's nice to have someone like that around.