T-ball 'tainment

Daelyn started t-ball on Thursday night. If you've never seen little kids playing baseball, you ought to stop by the Y some weeknight and observe. It's the cutest thing you could ever want to see.

There were as many dads on the field as kids. Every child had a mother or father standing next to them, coaching them through every move, usually unsuccessfully. Children hit the ball, then ran to second base. Others skipped bases altogether and headed for home plate. Tired children sat down in the outfield. One little girl bent down and watched the ball roll between her legs with no attempt to stop it. They're so small and so darling.

In the middle of practice Thursday night, one little boy burst into tears in the outfield. The coach talked to him, then the mama went to him. They left the field and never returned. I talked to the coach the next afternoon and he said the boy was afraid that someone might hit him with a bat. But he was in the outfield at the time of the tears, nowhere near a bat or a batter.

Later, Daelyn began to cry while in the outfield. The coach talked to him (I was trying to stay out of it and let the coach handle it), then looked at me and shrugged. I took off from the bench to see what was up with my little guy.

"I think I'm getting over-heated, Mom," he said, once I got him calmed down.

"Come over to the bench and have a nice, cold drink, son," I said, even though they had just had a drink break five minutes before. "Then maybe you'll want to go back out and play for a little while."

"I don't think so. I want to go home."

Daelyn had a good excuse. On the way home in the van, he threw up. He really was feeling poorly.

Before we left the field, I asked the coach how long the games run. Dane's baseball games run one hour or four innings.

"Do the little guys play for a full hour?" I asked.

"We play for as long as we can keep them on the field," the coach responded. I raised an eyebrow and looked questioningly at him.

"You can see, we start losing kids," the coach continued. "They drop like flies. And once they discover there are snacks here, it's very difficult to get them to play. So we keep the game going as long as we can. But, at the longest, that's 45 minutes from start to finish."

45 minutes worth of free entertainment. Fun for all.