Opening Day in Richmond

Thursday night we went to the 2017 Opening Day of the Richmond Flying Squirrels; I thought we were with Robert Scott in the Antarctic; had we not left in the 6^th inning we may have suffered a similar fate – my was it cold – C-O-L-D.

While the game was sold-out, not every seat was occupied. Why? Because it was C-O-L-D. Did I mention that it was windy too? Cold plus wind equals comfort – well, that’s what it means to our Border Collie Lily, but to the rest of us it is misery.

The Squirrels won 11 – 1; most of the runs were scored early in the game by a combination of hits, good base running, and the Hartford Yard Goats booting the ball around as if they were in the English Premier League.  

I mentioned in a previous post that opening day is like Christmas and Easter in church, a lot of the folks who attend won’t be back the rest of the season, or if they come they won’t come often. There is another similarity to opening day and church, if the weather is bad folks won’t come. Can’t say that I blame folks when it comes to sports; cold is cold and wet is wet and windy is windy – tain’t no point in being miserable.  In our case, once the misery scale hit a certain point it was time to leave. Unlike church where they do the offering somewhere during the service, in sports you make an offering to get in the stadium so I don’t think management cared too much that we left early.

When we got to the car I turned the heat up to 80 degrees…it took us about 25 minutes to get home…I was still cold. That isn’t right, these things ought not to be.

Yet…yet it was still opening day…and there is something about opening day…for one thing there is only one per year, and for another…it gives me that moment of hope for things to come…even if that hope only lasts for a moment, there is something about even a glimmer, ever so slight…of hope.