Heard it in a 12-step meeting for alcoholics and addicts here in Pittsburgh.
Happened maybe six or seven years ago. The discussion topic was "higher power." how do we see it? how does it work? Something along those lines. And so, in a small circle of fellow drunks, we went around one by one sharing our delicate journeys and intellectual hurdles. The usual snippets of wisdom. For me, GOD stands for Good Orderly Direction. … For me, as a Christian, I had to discover I’m not beholden to the god of my mom. … For me, as an atheist, I came to lean on the community in the rooms. … For me, my sponsor said I could choose anything for a higher power, even a chair in this room. Just so long as it ain’t me. … and so on.
Then at the very end of the meeting, there came one final share from an older man in his late 60s or early 70s. I’d seen him around but didn’t know him very well. I got the sense he’d been sober for about just as long as I’d been alive, maybe 30 years of not drinkin’. He was the kind of guy who favors vests over jackets. Thin hair, wrinkled khakis, brown pleather shoes. A guy for whom the inertia of time is coming—and yet, from the way he speaks, you suspect he’s been an old man his whole life.
This is what he said:
when i was a kid i used to love baseball. i wasn’t all that good at it. i wasn’t fast or strong or big but it was what we did. me and the neighborhood boys. on those long summer days. sometimes we’d play ball all day long. we played on a big field. it was an empty lot of grass and dirt and we could hit into an open field that came up against mrs. frank’s backyard. for bases, we’d pull out old cardboard scraps, empty pizza boxes, and we’d make our own diamond. we played until the sun fell behind the trees and we couldn’t see the ball in the dark.
then one summer, one of the older kids started hanging around. hank johnson. he was in high school and we were all younger. he smoked cigarettes and would sometimes even drive his dad’s car. and I think maybe he had moved into his uncle’s house for the summer because he was now suddenly always riding his bike up and down our street. and more and more older kids seemed to be following him too. on their bikes, back and forth, up and down our street. I don’t know why but they made us nervous.
and one day, we were playing ball and hank came over and asked if he could hit. he wanted to take a swing he said. and it was hank johnson, so of course we said yes. yes, of course, it’s hank johnson. you can’t say no to hank.
and so the pitcher threw the ball right over the plate and on his very first swing hank hit the ball harder and faster and farther than any of us could have imagined. the ball sailed in the air for what seemed like eternity and I’ll never forget the sound of glass breaking — and we could hear it so clear: the window to mrs frank’s back door shattering into a million pieces.
while we all stood there with our jaws dropped open, hank just kind of shrugged. got on his bike. and rode away.
by the time we got over to mrs frank’s to look for our ball, she was outside inspecting the window. she heard the commotion and was understandably mad. she looked right at me and said which one of you broke my window? and i looked at the broken window and i looked back at the pitching mound. swiveled my head. the window. the mound. the window. the mound. so many miles away. couldn’t she see?
it wasn’t us, i said.
you broke it, she said.
no not us, i said.
i didn’t want to tell on hank. because that would be big trouble. but i wanted her to see how it couldn’t have been us, a group of ten- and eleven-year-olds. string beans for arms. but i couldn’t explain it.
I just kept pointing to the diamond, as if to say, look! but now she was getting mad. hopping mad.
then how did it break? she said. how did it break?
i threw out my arms and said, how else? how else?
i could see hank johnson way down the street on his bike, small as an ant. so far away but so visible too.
i just kept saying it over and over: how else? how else? how else?!!?
and that's just how it is sometimes. how else?
All these years later, I can still picture the old man, arms extended, hands gesturing out to nowhere, telling the room, again and again: “How else?!?”
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This is the first post for me. I’ll be writing here regularly about stories, sports, and culture—things in the world that interest me and make me think. Occasionally, I’ll share my stories. Sometimes I’ll talk about literature, pop culture, and sports. But mostly, I’ll be writing about stories: how they work and why they work and why we tell them to each other. If you like the sound of this, it would be a great favor to me if you could share this newsletter with friends.
* A note on the photo: The image of Harlan Jackson (via WikiCommons) has essentially nothing to do with the article, other than representing the joy of baseball. But I found its backstory interesting. The Seattle Municipal Archives identify Harlan Jackson as the B.F. Day Playfield champion, winning the fifth annual Times Boy Pitchers' Contest. Apparently, competitors competed against a contraption they called “Old Woodenface.” The Daily Times described it as “a rectangular framework with an opening representing the height between a boy's knees and shoulders and the width of a 'home base'.” They dragged Old Woody around to 27 fields throughout the city, and our boy Harlan went on to compete in the All-City competition—where a youngster by the name of Harrison Lucas claimed the crown. And although Harlan lost at the next level, I say, in my book, he will always be a winner. Look at that smile! What a gem.
A great story that says something about the nature of stories. A pleasure to see this.