A day at the ballpark, sort of

Wednesday included 15 minutes of showering, buffing and brushing and 15 hours of work. No time to eat unless you count three strips of cold, rubbery turkey bacon and half-a-dozen slightly wrinkled cherry tomatoes which nobody really would. I did, however, fulfill all my volunteer, work and family obligations so I had that going for me. But best of all, I got to go to a ballgame — vicariously, which is my favorite way of attending a game. I had, pardon the pun, a ball.

I married a baseball fan, then gave birth to a baseball fan who now dates a baseball fan. I mention this because I am not a fan and still don't quite understand what planets aligned or cosmic dust collided that resulted in me being drafted into a fanatic family but, here I am loving all of them if not their sport.

So on Wednesday morning I kissed my husband goodbye and off he went to meet our daughter for the third game in a San Francisco Giants versus New York Mets series at Oracle Park. The Giants had won the first two games of the series so my dear ones had high hopes of seeing them win the first three-game series of their season.

And, as they always do, they had invited me along and, as I always do, I declined the invitation. Nevertheless, I was not left out of the adventure.

I got play-by-play action beginning at 10 a.m. with a “we're on our way” text followed by a noon “at the park entry” text. At 12:18 p.m. my daughter sent this message: “At our seats. It's raining. We didn't plan for rain, mom. LOL.”

As the afternoon progressed, I received texts which included: “3-0 Mets” and “Fitzgerald homered.” Knowing the first was bad and the second was good (even if I had no idea who Fitzgerald was until I Googled him), I replied to both with appropriate fan emotion: “Nooooo!” and “Yaaaaay!”

Then my phone went silent for quite a while and I knew that wasn't a good sign for the home team. But still, my family hadn't forgotten the woman they left behind. My daughter texted, “They're playing your song” which was accompanied by a video of the ballpark where Justin Timberlake's “Can't Stop the Feeling” was blaring. She followed up with, “Take a dance break, mom.” So I did.

Moments later I received a photo of their two wonderful but grumpy faces with this notation, “They're playing like sht.” To which, as the stayat-home empathizer, I replied, “Well that sucks.

The least they could do is play well in this midweek, you took time off work, drove hours (uphill both ways), father-daughter day at the ballpark game!”

“You'd think” came the reply followed at 3:38 p.m. by “8-2 loss. Heading home.”

I thought the day at the game was over. I was wrong.

When my husband rolled through the door about five hours later, I got a nearly play-by-play recap of the game. He'd recorded it so he could watch it again and regale me with not only commentary but also details of his and our daughter's experience.

I heard about the angles of the foul balls including the one he and my daughter thought was going to be a homer; the kid in their section with the too-big glove at the ready to catch a foul; the women sitting behind them who “knew their stuff” about baseball; and Francisco Lindor going 4-for-5 with four RBI, making this the 16th multi-homer game of his career. Then I heard blah-blah-blah as I got distracted doing a quick “who is Francisco Lindor” Google search on my phone.

When I tuned back in, I heard about the bad calls; the fleeting moments of hope; the broken bats; the “amazing” number of kids at the game and not in school; the fact that the Giants used seven pitchers; and that LaMonte Wade Jr. scored on a throwing error by Pete Alonso in the bottom of the ninth but it was too little, too late.

Throughout all of this, I made the appropriate exclamations and faces while enjoying my first real food of the day, a fabulous half of a ballpark beef burrito. So when my daughter texted that they'd had a lot of fun and wished I'd been with them, I told her it was all good. What with the texts and photos and music and the personal commentary and the ballpark food and, most especially, their sharing their joy in spending the day together with me, I didn't feel left out at all. In fact, it was the best game I never went to.