Category: Nonfiction

Prior to attending a minor league baseball game recently, I learned about racing events that occur at certain ballparks:

• pierogi races
• sausage races
• Presidents races

“Baseball is so schlocky,” I said after viewing a YouTube video of the Presidents with their oversized heads teetering along the perimeter of the field. “No other professional sport has anything like this.”

“That’s not true,” my husband replied. “They throw octopuses onto the ice in hockey.”

After learning that, indeed, there is a Legend of the Octopus, I still expressed skepticism: “Could you imagine a whole bunch of sausages running around on a football field?”

“Football has cheerleaders,” my husband retorted.

Good point.

The mascot was busy at the minor league baseball game. Not only did Rhubarb the Reindeer hustle around the stadium with a flag at the start of the game, but he also came out in boxing regalia at one point and, later, wearing a dress shirt and slacks, “performed” a Talking Heads song.

A few rows behind us a man with a voice rattling with gravel shouted at the players:

This is baseball, not first base ball!
Communicate!
Boring!

His son started shouting similar things at the players. When we turned around to see who they were, we realized that the higher pitched voice did not come from his son; it came from his wife.

When the 7th inning came around, we all stood up and sang “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” in different keys. I then ate some Cracker Jack.

I wondered if all this schlock these rituals are meant to appease our short attention spans. Ball 1, ball 2, strike 1… the man with the gravel in his throat shouts unsolicited advice, people get up to buy hot dogs and beer, the bugle calls “Charge!” It’s hard to wait. We want stuff to happen.

Then I wondered if these rituals give us simple comfort while everything else changes. Even if my boss doesn’t give me enough time or credit for the work I do or my wife is angry at me for reasons I think are ridiculous or my kid is not meeting my academic expectations or my friends are worried I have a drinking problem or my boyfriend has hit me twice this week or I lost all of my savings at the casino or my sister died in a car crash last month…

… at least I know that I can caterwaul “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” in the 7th inning, Rhubarb the Reindeer will dance on top of the dugout, and the pierogies will race.

Shortly after my mother died, a coworker asked me about grief: “What does it feel like?”

I remember looking at her and feeling confused. What does it feel like…?

Words like “terrible”, “awful”, “really sad”, and “numb” didn’t seem quite right. Elements of all those adjectives were true, but none of them captured the fine texture of grief.

“It feels like… a really bad breakup,” I finally said. As the words came out of my mouth I realized that wasn’t quite right. It was also an inane comparison.

“Huh,” she answered.

Nine months later, I found words to describe my grief: It feels like my heart is falling.

During moments of stillness, those spaces between exhalations and inhalations, I feel my heart physically dropping. It is an endless fall; there is no bottom.

I remain surprised with how close to the surface the grief lives. I don’t cry when I talk about my mother’s death. Yet, when people ask me about her, I feel my face scrunching up the way faces do when people are about to cry. The sensations in my face remind me of that week she was in the hospital, when I smiled during the day and wept at night, asking God and the Universe questions that nobody could answer.

Though the tears do not come, my face suggests they will. And I know that the person listening to me sees it. It’s like when you blush: You feel your cheeks flash with heat and hope that the other person won’t make fun of you for it.

Emotions always shift, though: Sometimes, in my mind’s eye, I set an imaginary table and place a pot of steaming tea and two cups on it. I invite Grief to sit down and have tea with me. Grief never declines. I ask Grief how it is doing. Grief never says anything in response, but we sit in silence and enjoy our tea together. When Grief is ready, it leaves.

And then I notice that my heart is no longer falling.

Almost 11 months have passed since my mother died. Since I found words for my grief, my heart doesn’t feel like it is dropping as often. Maybe the time I needed has elapsed; maybe the sensation of my heart falling doesn’t overwhelm me as much as it used to.

Maybe by showing Grief some kindness and acceptance with imaginary tea it has also shown kindness to me.