the days are getting shorter again
First let's talk about the no-hitter.
A typical day in San Francisco, halfway through the summer, and it was windy, sunny, beautiful. It was a Friday, not that that means anything to me, tetherless and beyond obligation as I am. But it was a Friday, anyway. The sky was blue.
A friend of mine called Jess had recently returned from back east, and we took a ride from Cole Valley up to the Richmond to see my man Dave who is a provider of herbal refreshments. We were listening to the game in the car because it was summertime and baseball season; from April to October my radio can't find anything else. Duane Kuiper dropped his voice down low to report, "swiiing and a miss." Dave Flemming chattered away all good-natured, describing the flags blown perfectly straight by the wind.
Listening to baseball on the radio--it's like Beatles music, something I have always known and never learned, that very specific sensation of home that comes with every note.
So we hung around Dave's place watching the game and talking about Michael Jackson, and Jonathan Sanchez kept striking guys out and I kept saying, "attago Jonny boy, attago," and Dave kept saying, "Goddamn what a pretty change-up."
Jess and I left sometime in the fourth inning, too soon for me even to notice the glaring zero in the box score, too soon to knock on wood or clonk heads, too soon to jinx it in any way. We went back to the Haight in search of Vietnamese food for dinner, met up with Mike C. and Matt J. and they were already drunk, already intent on buying some of the shitty coke that these self-styled punks like so well. We went back to Jess's place and someone jammed their iPod in the speaker, started playing Thriller for the nine thousandth time since the man passed. Resources were pooled and Joe Blow was called and I was sent out to his car when he showed up, two little grams in my pocket and that ratcheting too-eager feeling going through me even though I don't even like cocaine.
Smash-cut, two or three hours later, one gram bag hollow and empty on the coffee table, the other just dented. I don't know how much experience you have with that moment in the night when you and three other people have been doing too much coke and smoking too many cigarettes and playing Wii with martial ferocity, that moment in the night when you realize that your hands are shaking too much to roll the jay that will keep them from shaking.
It's lowering, clarifying in a quiet sort of way. You've given over another night to these lovely inconstant friends, to razors made penny-colored by rust (that bite of copper before your lips go numb), to your own face in the mirror, zoomed-in and blinking back at you from between the white lines. You've slipped back into the second person again, and you know that's never a good sign.
But then I got a text message from a friend who'd made it to the game. My phone was hovering right on the arm of the couch, awoken suddenly with vibrations and toppling to the floor. I flipped it open and read: 'SANCHEZ THREW A NO HITTER VAMOS GIGANTES.'
I cried out! I felt suddenly lit-up, shocked and amazed and scrambling for Jess's computer. Mike came up, overly friendly the way he gets after a long day, and draped himself on my back, bemoaned, "Baseball, baseball, it's always baseball with you," and I said, "yes yes yes."
Jonathan Sanchez has thrown a no-hitter. Jonathan Sanchez threw a perfect game, but you can't tell because Juan Uribe made an error, but Jonathan Sanchez doesn't care. Jonathan Sanchez's father was there, the first time he'd seen his son pitch in a major league uniform. Jonathan Sanchez was pitching out of the bullpen a week ago. Jonathan Sanchez has always had the stuff, always had the look, but he has been making the mistakes of youth for years now and earlier this season I half-defended him by saying, "He's young, but he's been young for a really long time."
Jonathan Sanchez is all grown up now.
I couldn't even Wii-bowl properly. I was too excited. I had a stupid goofy grin on my face and it wouldn't be moved. My razor, a line cut out for me on the mirror, that thrum and steady pull in my mind (do some more do some more do some more), but I wasn't a junkie anymore, not just then. I was strung-out and half-overdosed and had no intention of stopping, but all I was at that moment was a baseball fan.
And then a couple weeks passed. I cleaned up in a marginal way. If I wasn't a drug addict I could probably live on a thousand dollars a month. I need to get a job. I need to write that review of Moneyball and edit my friends' website essays. My brothers have left me voicemails and I have sent them emails, and we are only as close as we allow ourselves to be.
Aaron came back. He'd been gone all summer counseling at his much-loved Jew camp, and came home to San Francisco for a job interview. He was only around for about forty-eight hours, but it was time enough to go to the A's game.
I hadn't been to a game in almost a month. Last season I saw fifty-six games, the year before I think it was fifty-two (which was so smart, considering I had even less of a job then than I do now). I'm at thirteen this season, a week past the All-Star Break, and of course am deeply shamed. Basically, I could either keep going to baseball games or keep getting fucked up, and, you know, baseball on the radio is free.
But me and Aaron were going, A's-Twins at the Coliseum, banging along to the drums because baseball baseball baseball, the other more-merciful beat in my mind. It was overcast and chilly in the Mission District, but the sun can only shine on Oakland, and it was blue skies by the time we were speeding past the Imperial Walkers, wide-eyed watching downtown whisk past to the left. We went to the Circle-K on the far side of Hegenberger and bought Chex Mix and Combos, Ho-Hos and chocolate Zingers and three Chocodiles because they were selling at fifty-nine cents apiece and you can never count on Chocodiles to be there the next time.
They've cracked down on the scalpers on the BART bridge, plainsclothed cops with white earpieces screwed in clustered around Hollis who used to get me two tickets for ten dollars every time I showed up last year (Hollis calls me 'baby' and is always saying, "Smile, girl, smile!"). I exchanged a look with Hollis over the cops' shoulders and his eyebrows urged me on, so it was to the ticket window for Aaron and I, the first time I'd bought legitimately in about two seasons. There we were with our pockets full of ones, pulling forth crumpled singles and pairs, counting like elementary schoolers--"sixteen, seventeen, um, eighteen, ah, I have some quarters?"--and shooting apologetic glances to the rest of the line, feeling like I'd stumbled into a sketch comedy of some kind.
But we got in, found seats on the third base side just in time for first pitch. The Oakland Coliseum, sporting a reported ten thousand people (pretty laughable--there were maybe seven thousand of us that night), pretty lavender sky closed in a bowl shape, the light standards set high and white, glowing against the gathering dim. I love this place. Aside from all the places that I have actually lived, I think I have literally spent more time at the Oakland Coliseum than anywhere else on this planet. I've sat in every section; I've seen every angle. I know how to sneak into the bleachers and how to get out quickly at the end of the night. I know where you can get popcorn chicken and where you can find the best selection of caps. I am deeply, unalterably at peace in those slick green stadium seats.
The Twins went up 3-0 in the top of the first, two walks and a dinger, and Aaron said, "Fuck, so much for this game," and I said, "Oh my god, we haven't even batted yet," and then he stole some of my Chex Mix. The A's came back, scored two on some neat small-ball in the bottom of the first, and I was saying, "Ha, ha, faithless boy, choke on your lack of faith!" and then in the second the Twins batted around and went back-to-back, grand slam and a solo shot and now it was 8-2.
And I started saying, "Chip chip chip, boys, chip chip chip," which is what I always say when the score gets so lopsided so early on, because with it comes that essential baseball feeling: I know that they won't be able to chip away a six-run deficit, but at the same time, I believe wholeheartedly and with everything in me that they will.
Baseball, man.
In the third inning the Twins scored another four runs, and now it was 12-2. Gio Gonzalez, the A's starter, had given up eleven earned runs, and was left hung out to dry because they'll play 28 games in 28 days and everyone assumed the damage was already insurmountable. Aaron and I wondered how much worse it would get, recollecting a 16-2 Giants loss for which we had stayed every minute. I said, "Whatever, at least we're here."
And then?
Chip chip chip.
The A's scored three runs in the third. They scored another two in the fourth. It was 12-7 and the Jumbotron informed us that '7 runs + A's win = Free Pepsi!' and we laughed all caustic and cynical, "Well, we got seven runs, just need another seven and we're home free!"
We were joking.
The Twins tacked on another, and coming in to the seventh inning it was 13-7. A kid named Breslow came out of the 'pen to pitch for the A's, and I said, "Breslow? Jimmy Breslow?" meaning, of course, Jimmy Breslin, a name that has stuck itself in my head for some obscure reason, and Aaron said, "um, I don't think so," but it was too late, as I was already mid-holler, "Locate, Jimmy, locate!"
It's Craig Breslow, incidentally. But he's Jimmy for life as far as I'm concerned--it turned out to be really good luck.
The bottom of the seventh inning. I have my scorebook here and it is a wreck, ink-stained and peppered with exclamation points, great clumsy circles, crookedly-drawn hearts. The A's just kept getting on base. Solid singles through the hole, drawn-out walks, and the bases were full of aces (as Bill King used to say). We were yelling, slamming our hands on the seats. Aaron had his cap rallied and I was wearing my glove on my head. Let's go Oakland, let's go Oakland. Lemme hear ya.
Orlando Cabrera hit a double to deep right, and now it was 13-9. Scott Hairston walked to load them up again, and up came Matt Holliday.
So, that baseball feeling? That way you can know something and believe its opposite at the same moment? It came back so strong. I had visions of doubles, triples rattling around in the corners, my legs jittering and my heart hammering along. I was hollering, "C'mon Matty give it a ride!"
And then he did.
You could tell the moment it hit the bat. Matt Holliday launched that motherfucker, and I was on my feet screaming and leaping and pounding on Aaron's back and he was trying to hold me up. I hugged the older couple sitting in front of us. I hugged the gangsta boys sitting behind us. The whole stadium was out of its mind with joy. All of us praying for the same thing, and seeing it come true--
Goddamn, baseball.
The Twins pulled Keppel and brought in some guy named Mijares, and he promptly gave up a home run to my one, my own Jack Cust. The ball hit the moon, fell back down just inches behind the wall, inches beyond the straining center fielder's glove, and now it was 13-14 and the A's had taken the lead.
I cannot properly describe what that feels like. I have no voice today, just this pale whispery little rasp. I tweaked my knee jumping around like a lunatic and now it twinges with every step I take. We sang, we danced, we embraced the strangers at our sides. You know how I consider baseball to be church? Last night we became Pentecostal.
It's so fragile, is the problem, all that overwhelming joy, that wondrous disbelief, and it's all shot to hell as soon as the Twins hit another dinger. Just one hanging curveball and the mania trades in for depression, just as all-consuming. This is what baseball does to you; this is how tight the rope you need to walk is.
But we go to the top of the ninth inning with that ever-so-slim lead barely intact, and Michael Wuertz promptly struck out the first two. We were on our feet, arms hard around each other's shoulders. We were screaming, "One more, babe, just one more," and we were fighting to hold on to that marvelous thing inside, that deathless hope carved out in code by the game of baseball.
Cuddyer hit a double. Wuertz intentionally walked Kubel, who'd been having an absurd game alongside Justin Morneau and Matt Holliday, and now there were two on, two outs, and we couldn't think of anything new to yell so we just yelled the same old stuff, until it was just, "Please, please, please," over and over again.
Wuertz buried a slider in the dirt. It sprang twenty feet in the air, flipped back behind Kurt Suzuki's head as he tore off his mask. Suzuki couldn't find the ball, it had ricocheted back to the backstop and he couldn't see it, he couldn't see it, and the voice of the whole stadium was giving out, screaming, "There, there," and Kurt Suzuki couldn't see.
Cuddyer was around third, breaking for home, and a crazy fear stuffed itself into my throat, strangled me because I could see it happening, the pieces drawing together. Cuddyer thundering down the third baseline and Wuertz stumbling, covering home, and the runner was too fast, Suzuki didn't have the ball yet, it was all going to fall apart right here. Cuddyer would score the tying run. Whatever miraculous frequency the A's had found would vanish like sugar in the rain, and we'd lose, either right there or in extra innings, we'd lose, we'd go home with the absence ringing inside us, the stunning night that could have been.
Suzuki made the short toss to Wuertz and he slammed his glove down on Cuddyer's leg and I thought Cuddyer was safe, because as it turned out he was, but it didn't matter, the reality of the thing didn't matter: he was called out.
The game was over. The place went nuts. However many of us were left, watching the last major league baseball game being played that night, maybe five or six thousand at that point and every one of us dancing. Every one of us singing.
There is so much trouble in my life. There are all these things that I should do, or meant to do, or swore to do. I go day to day and I try to do the next right thing, and if I have fallen short of what I might have been, well, I'm in awful good company. I don't worry about this stuff like I should. I just wanna go back to the ballpark. I want to feel this way all the time.