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Mama, don’t let your baby grow up to be a snowflake…
I do not want to raise a kid that can’t do anything for himself. I want Alex to be able to function on his own when he goes to college in a few years, to do his own laundry-especially to get dirt stains out of baseball pants-and to manage his time so that he can study and also have fun. So far, Alex is learning most of the skills he needs, so now I am tackling the biggie-money management. One of the best lessons I did as a parent was during the summer when Alex was about 12 years old and he wanted to buy fast food all the time…
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This Cathedral for Boys, This Cathedral of Dreams
in the summertime,within the ivy-covered walls,upon the sun-drenched grass, the green, green grasswhere full grown boys lived out my dreams,in nine inning shares of timelessness,to hear the thunder of Ted Williams’ bat,to watch the smooth, smooth stride of Willie Mays,to sit in awe of lads once like me,but who grew up somewhere to become so much more,these mythic figures of a mythic game,a game once began on sandy backlots,now continued on fields in majestic ballparks,they are all grown up these once little boys,grown-up beyond the reach of mortals who wear tailored grey suits as they go to work,they live in realms of near perfection,they walk in air beyond our own,they…
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The Home Team by David Collins
Most of us are born to our allegiances. Especially for the home team. Our fathers taking us to our first baseball game, the perfectly manicured green grass and white on white of the baselines so precisely laid out before us as giants warmed up under the brilliant summer sun. From then to eternity that team was mine. It binds us to a town a city, an era, it becomes who we are, it defines us in ways beyond rational explanation. We wear our loyalty in game jerseys with our hero’s name emblazoned on the back, we paint our faces our team’s colors, we name our children after our favorite players.…
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Top 10 reasons why I love baseball
by Aron Wallad 1. The Ultimate Challenge Hitting a round ball with a round bat. The feeling I would get when I hit the ball. Just think of a baby that is crying for food. When that baby gets her bottle the first thing you hear is that ahhhhh sound. Oh that ah. When I hit a ball perfectly I would have that ahhhhh. 2. I call it contentment at a high level. I played all the time when I was a kid. Some of my favorite memories were from the diamond. When I hit two home runs in one game off the star pitcher form our High School team. I rounded…
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San Diego
I loved living in San Diego. I moved there in 1990 to begin my freshman year at UC San Diego, a school that I would probably never get into today if I applied! UCSD was perched on the cliffs of La Jolla, and if you had the right dorm room, like my friend Natalie did, your dorm room might even have an ocean view. I met my now husband, Greg, at UCSD in 1992. He’s from the Bay Area, but I did not hold that against him as long as he didn’t limit my paper towel usage. We are a mixed marriage-I’m Catholic and he is Jewish, he is a…
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Baseball and How It Relates to Life
By Colby M Brown Baseball has been my favorite sport ever since I can remember. The crack of the bat, the sound of the ball hitting the glove, all bring me joy. Baseball also has a lot of lessons that can relate to life. A strong work ethic, learning from failure, and having fun, are three valuable lessons I have learned from baseball that I apply to my everyday life. Lessons that I will never forget and try to improve on daily. Having a strong work ethic is vital in baseball. How do you expect to be good at it if you don’t work hard at it? The key to…
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Moms in a puddle of goo…
5th grade promotion, 2013 Windrows Elementary, Rancho Cucamonga CA Picture a video of our little cherubs while these tearjerkers played in the background. Not nice, Windrows!
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Where did the time go?
Alex takes his driving test on Friday. He is not all that excited, probably because driving adds an entirely new level of responsibility that he is not eager to embrace. While I am excited to have Alex drive for practical purposes, like his baseball games, I am sad too. He was a little boy five minutes ago, right? 2018-Alex could not even deal with his mom taking her annual “first day of school” picture, but since he got his driver’s license over the summer and he was driving to school for the first time-I was going to take his picture no matter how irritated he was. …
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Can We Actually Stop These Student School Shootings?
By Arnold Nadler Just so you know my father was a passionate person about hunting! Downstairs in our finished basement we had a wood glass case he built for his gun collection. It was situated adjacent to a full bar where my parents entertained. He was proud and knowledgeable about his guns showing explaining about them. The gun case had no locks, myself nor any of my friends wouldn’t have ever considered taking a gun out without permission. Safety was priority on how I was taught to handle and carry them. Dad was proud of his two pointing dogs, as well as being part of his prestigious hunting club. When I…
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Effort Is the Secret to Success
By Daniel Blanchard The Strenuous Life is the name of a speech given by Theodore Roosevelt in Chicago, Illinois on April 10, 1899. Based upon personal experiences, he argued that the strenuous effort and overcoming hardship were ideals to be embraced by Americans for the betterment of the nation and the world in the 20th century. Well, here we are now just beginning the 21st century and I think Teddy Roosevelt’s preaching about effort, both on the personal level and a national level are as valuable today as they were over a century ago. The more things change, the more they stay the same, right? It’s just a fact. Things don’t get…
