Wednesday 6 August 2014

Baseball


On Sunday we went to the baseball.
On the way in a security guard asked me to open my bag.
'Would you mind opening your bag, ma'am,'
I knew it was not possible to 'mind' and still be allowed in, so I opened it.
Using a drumstick, the security man poked around at my camera and the tampons and dirt in the bottom of my bag.
Then he let me in and someone immediately gave me a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle eye mask.

The way to the seats is paved with food and merchandise and beer stands.
The baseball ground smells of boiled oil and sugar.
On Sundays military people get free entry and there's a whole section of the stand way up high that is ochre dots.
People in military uniforms.
At the beginning of the game a person in a dark blue military uniform sings, her face projected on to a gigantic screen.
The announcer thanks all the military people and the military people in the seats stand up and everyone else stands up and claps and woops.
Then they sing a song about the USA and people stay standing and some put their hands where their hearts are.
Throughout the afternoon people woop and cheer when the military is mentioned.
Intermittently baseball is played.

It's sort of like a beer and junk food fueled church sermon.
The announcer is the preacher and we all follow.
Stand up, sing.
Sit down, eat.
A man in front of me comes back to his seat with 4 gigantic containers of coke.
The man in front of us wearing a camouflage Padre's shirt drinks beer.
I eat two hotdogs.
I fall asleep.

'I wanted to like the baseball,' I said to K last night in the car, 'I wanted to really like something stereotypically American, have something to go to that I really enjoyed.'

But I didn't.
Cricket it ain't.



*******
Look at my shop and get a print.

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