I do not play softball. I do not play softball. I do not — softball or baseball or any even remotely similar kinds of ball. I do not. OK? That’s what you have to know, for this to maybe begin to make sense.

pigeon

Roy ballet dancing on the softball field

The tour had ended.

For the rest of the summer, I was in love.

Someone had volunteered to host a big picnic bbq cookout softball game, and of course I was invited because I had been part of the tour, little 16 year old me with this ragtag cluster of college kids and a couple of very patient middle-aged guys in the mix, including my dad of course, as our director. And also Walter — I had no idea then how old he was and, looking back, I still have no idea. Poor old crazy bastard Walter.

And also invited of course, the girl I had fallen in love with the night I stayed at her house in Small Town, MO. That’s how we saved money — local people in the towns where we did our show provided lodging so we didn’t have to blow our budget on hotels.

I couldn’t play softball in front of anyone, let alone the person I was in love with. (Even if she hadn’t been a whole year older than me!)

Therefore I feigned an all consuming fascination with manning the boom box.

I played songs from my Yes tapes. Certain key members of this group appreciated Yes. There’s even another pigeon about specifically that!

I played other stuff. Exactly what, I couldn’t say, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the mix included Clapton, Rush, The Monkees (god help us), Herbie Hancock, Van Halen....

Perhaps craving some kind of special attention, eventually I said “This’ll get ’em!” and mashed the play button on Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major. Kelly, my self-appointed social coach who had, weeks before, told me, “Say your jokes louder, or else no one will laugh at them!” — she chuckled at me, shook her head and said, “Oh, Mat...” Kelly had also more than once told me I looked like a muppet. So obviously she was very perceptive about a number of things.

No sooner had the delicate arpeggios of the Allegro begun to lilt across the stubbly field than Roy, who was poised to pitch, lifted his gangly frame into a comical approximation of en pointe, and began to prance and dance balletically about the mound, still clutching the ball like some kind of mystic orb at the end of his outstretched arm.

Now that was improv! That was “Yes, and!”

That was someone who knew how to not take certain things too damned seriously.

Unlike, of course, me.

At least one of the guys from that group is dead now — fell off a roof. I think another one is dead too — I’ll have to ask my dad, I don’t remember the details. People die a lot, you ever notice that? What the fuck is up with that.

I don’t know what became of the girl I was in love with. A friend and I drove the hour and a half down to her town one time a few months later so I could drop in and see her, but she wasn’t home, so I turned the car around and drove straight back, all clenched and dramatic. Gas was 87¢ a gallon, so, you know, I guess it wasn’t all that big a tragedy.

I remember leaving the bbq softball cookout at the end of the afternoon. Long shadows. Piling into the back of someone’s car. Looking longingly out the dusty window as my true love waved goodbye (the party was in her town, so she was already basically home — in fact it might have been her family that had hosted it). Kind of feeling like crying, kind of knowing that I should feel like crying. My most vivid remnant of that moment is the way the golden sunlight refracted through the fine layer of dust on the car window.

Lost in your own thoughts in the back seat. Drifting off. Hovering down the highway. Someone else is driving and you’re safe for now. Being in love for the first time. Having that gaping trench in your heart, keeping the drama of it going, the way you keep a dream going when you’re half awake but don’t wanna open your eyes just yet. Five more minutes. Just give me five more minutes to be in love.