I have been waiting for the day when I had six treatments left because the number 6 has been very important in my life. The reason that it's so important to me is that it's the number worn by my Uncle, Mark Church.
When I was seven years old, my dad was killed in a car accident. His brother, my uncle, stepped in and became a father figure to me and my brothers. He frequently asked us if we wanted to go with him and his family to softball tournaments and he used to pick us up for open gym so that we could go and play with our cousins. My first ever Tiger game was with him. It was a double-header against Toronto, and this was back when they let you pay for one and stay for both. I will never forget that night at Tiger Stadium yelling for Rusty Staub to get a hit. The Tigers lost both games that night and I couldn't have cared less. I was there, finally getting to go to a pro game.
Some of my favorite times as a kid were going to those softball tournaments, especially the ones in Midland. When my Uncle's team played at the stadium there, all of us kids were in heaven. We lived and died with the team. Even though my dad was no longer playing, my mom remained as the scorekeeper and so we were able to go to most of the games. When they would lose, there would be crying and silence on the way home and it was always the umpire's fault that we had lost.
I loved watching my uncle pitch. As far as I was concerned, he was a God on the mound. He threw the best knuckle ball I've ever seen and when that pitch was working, Uncle Mark was unhittable. Period. I can't even tell you how many times I watched him after a game, putting some kind of new skin stuff on the tips of his cracked and bleeding fingers. He would let them sit for a couple of hours and then go out and throw another game.
Uncle Mark was the uncle who would always play with the kids. He would play dead and when one of us would get close enough to him, he'd latch on to a foot or a shirt and pull you in. Then you'd escape and the game would start over again. Once, while playing some variation of this game at his house, I jumped on his back when he was facing the other way. I jumped off a bed because he was taller than me and as my hand reached around the front of him, I hit him right in the nose. It bled a lot and I thought for sure I had broken it. After we got home, I cried for an hour because I thought he'd never play with us again because of what I had done.
After a time, mom decided that she wasn't going to go to all the games. Uncle Mark took us to the games, and often pay for our meals and things like that. I never gave that a second thought and certainly never thanked him for it. It's not that I wasn't grateful because I was, extremely so. I just don't think that at that age I thought about any other aspect of a softball trip than simply being there.
When I graduated from high school, I wanted nothing more than to play for his softball team. He tried to warn me off, telling me that they had a lot of guys and that he wasn't sure how much playing time I'd get. He suggested that I may want to look for a team that would be able to play me more than he was going to be able to. I wasn't hearing any of that business though. I told him that I just wanted to be on a winning team and I didn't mind sitting. At the time, I think I actually believed that.
And it wasn't as though I didn't get my chances. I did sit a lot in my first couple years, but after that, there were a lot of guys who were just showing up for tournaments, so I'd get to play in the league games. There are a couple of things that are important to note at this point. The first is, that most everyone on that team was extremely confident in their abilities, and I was not. The second thing, is that no matter how much I wish it would have been otherwise, I was simply, flat-out not good enough to play as a regular on that team. I remember the day that I came to this conclusion, even though I didn't accept it at the time.
I didn't help myself either. Most everyone on that team had a nickname and my Uncle's was Hambone, which immediately got shortened to Hammy. Instead of simply calling him Hammy like everyone else, I called him Uncle Hammy. Yes, during the games too. I mean, he was my uncle. I don't think I ever addressed him without calling him Uncle. In my head, it was a law or something. Looking back at it now, I think the law actually read “if you have an uncle with a nickname and you call him Uncle prior to using the nickname, you shall forever be known as the team doofus.”
G.H. Johnston Builders was the name (sponsor) of Uncle Mark's team and while I can't remember what their rival team was called at the time, it was always the same group of guys playing. It may have been the Fire House Bar out of Rose City. Some of the regular guys couldn't be there that night so I got to play. I was in left field and just praying for a lot of ground balls so I didn't screw up. Midway through the game, it was my turn to bat and I could see Uncle Mark looking at me as I went to the plate. He called time out and came over to talk to me and his direct quote to me was “Get a hit, you little dick.” I was thrilled because that's how he talked to the guys, not his nephew. Their pitcher was a guy named Clare something (I can't remember his last name) I took a couple of pitches and then hit a ball right back up the middle. I remember being pumped as I ran to first base and then crushed as the first baseman took the throw a half-step before I got to the bag. The shortstop (Brian Hill) had made a great play on me almost behind the bag at second and threw me out. It's probably not true, but I still remember that play as a make or break moment for me with that team. If I had gotten that hit and driven in that run, maybe things would have turned out differently.
I went to another team after a couple more years and although I enjoyed playing more often, I missed the atmosphere and the winning that surrounded his team. At the time though, I was mad. It was somehow his fault that I wasn't confident or good enough to play with that team. The only thing worse than playing for him was playing against him. Like I said earlier, playing on GH meant exuding confidence, and I simply didn't have it. I would get so geeked up when we played them that I never played worth a shit. One of these games really sticks in my head. I was having my usual terrible game against GH and had already committed three errors playing second base. Uncle Mark came up to bat and hit a ground ball right at me. I immediately tensed up and bobbled the ball so badly that Fat Albert could have picked up the rest of the gang and carried them down to first base and been safe by two feet. Instead, as I finally got a handle on the ball, I picked it up and realized that Uncle Mark had not even run it out and had just gone back into the dugout. I realize now that he was trying to be decent to me, but at the time I hated him for it. I was embarrassed because I couldn't catch a cold, and again, he got all the blame.
We also went through the same thing on the basketball court, although to a much smaller degree. I was a better basketball player than a softball player, although one thing held true in both sports. When I played for his team, I always played so nervously that I was terrible. When I started playing for another team, some of the girlfriends on the team taped the games. There was a play where I put a pump fake on a guy and got around him only to go up for a shot and collide with Uncle Mark. I made the shot and was yelling for a foul at the same time he was yelling for a charge. I think I watched that part of the tape so many times, it just wore out.
I know a lot of this may sound negative, but thinking about it now, it really wasn't. I eventually gained that confidence that I lacked as a kid, and I know that's because of the lessons I learned from Uncle Mark.
A lot of what I am today is made up of things I learned from him. My competitiveness, confidence, and aggressiveness are all directly from him, and all have come in handy in my current battle.
I want to tell you Thank-You Uncle Mark. Even though I don't know if I've ever said it to you or not, but if I couldn't have my dad, I was and am lucky to have you as my uncle. You have impacted my life in a lot of ways, and not all in the sports realm.
I have six treatments left. I will beat this thing, and in part, it will be because of things I learned from my Uncle Mark.
I Will Win
No comments:
Post a Comment