It is Election Day or if you live in the Bay area, it is the day after the Giants win the World Series day. I know that my mother up in heaven has been watching with glee and I think the morning crescent moon was a little brighter from all the champagne popping and celebration.
I am enjoying the enthusiasm of people I know, who I had no idea watched baseball, and maybe they didn't, until this week.
Maybe, for many of us, it is the first time we knew that fast balls have a range of speeds. I thought it meant you throw as hard as you can. It seems these great pitchers change the speeds by as much as ten miles an hour. Maybe more. Can you imagine even throwing a ball at ten miles an hour, let alone ninety and then being able to change the speed?
I always heard about nuance in baseball but never "got" it. I was told if I watched enough, it would make sense to me what was going on with each of the nine players on the field and the batters. Maybe it is easier to get the sport when your team wins against the team of a man who no matter how hard you try to merge yourself into the land of non-judgment, you still twinge in disgust when you see his face. Why does George Bush put his hand on the center of his chest during God Bless America? His wife certainly doesn't.
Anyway, I'm glad it's over so we can focus on the election. Tonight we can watch the results without distraction.
Robert Frost said that "We love the things we love for what they are." I wonder if we also love them for who we are. Are we changed by a baseball game, by watching a group of guys in grace, focus, balance, presence and awareness of the connection between fear and breath perform a ballet? Certainly our mirror neurons must be activated and enhanced.
The air here is clear and squeaky clean. I feel my heart taken out for a walk as I welcome this day and the awareness that, goofy as it is, I live in a land where I can vote.