On the cutting room floor

Chapter 2:

Making Mudpies

January, 1976

The mud in the backyard of the house isn’t all that great for digging--making mud pies, things like that.  You stir the dry ground with a stick and try hard to get some sort of creamy concoction by adding water from the faded hose into the empty margarine container with the pale-yellow, floral design.  You want the mixture to look like cake batter does when they cook cake on TV—how smooth it all is when it enters the cake pan and folds on top of itself like an accordion--no lumps.  That's the consistency you’ve been hoping to make for a long time now.  It’s 1976 (year of the bicentennial--woohoo!) as you sit in that suburban Cincinnati backyard.   Your thick, dull, brown, seven-year-old hair flies in your face (rubber bands never hold when you're little) while you stir a slice of the earth with a stick.

All you get are clumps.

Thud.  Andy’s in the backyard with Pete.  Thud.  They toss a tennis ball back and forth and catch it in their mitts.  They do this for a long time.  Mother won’t let them throw a hard ball anymore because of the two broken windows.  Mother says they’re lucky they didn’t demolish Nana's antique green, glass vase that was behind the second window that broke.  Thud.  Mother said it almost became a casualty too.  (It has air bubbles in it, but she still likes it!)  Nope, no more hardballs.  Andy’s relieved anyway; Mother has a habit of making him real nervous about breaking another window.  So, throwing a hardball isn't an option any more ever since he broke the second one (even though it was Pete who broke it, Andy took the blame.  Andy didn’t want to give Mother an excuse to be mad at Pete).  It’s all about tossing tennis balls in the backyard now.  

Thud.  They throw the ball with such seriousness--their faces tight, as if what they’re doing is real important.  Thud.  Sometimes they talk while they toss--about girls, about school, about kids they hate, baseball.  Sometimes they talk so much and with such enthusiasm, they talk over each other, try to out-loud the other, out-fast-talk the other, and eventually out-gross-out the other.  Sometimes they don’t talk at all and all you hear are the thuds.

During their time in the backyard, they transform into professional baseball players.  You must sell concessions: “Get your ice-cold chocolate cake HE ERE!  Get your ice-cold chocolate cake!  Come for your ice-cold chocolate cake while I eternally try to get all the lumps out!  Meanwhile, it’s icy-cold, clumpy cake!  Get your ice-cold cake!”

(not me.)

Sometimes, when Pete doesn’t show, you get to toss. You and Andy transform into famous athletes.  You can be anybody, not just baseball players.  The only rule is that if he chooses a tennis player, you have to be a tennis player.  If he chooses a baseball player, likewise.  That’s the only rule: you have to stay in the same sport.  You always choose the same ones over and over and over again.  In baseball, he’s Johnny Bench, you’re Pete Rose.  Tennis: he’s John McEnroe, you’re Jimmy Connors.  Football: he’s Terry Bradshaw, you’re O.J. Simpson.

These are good people!  Admirable!  Role models. 

While you play, the fans stare at you.  They root, they cheer.  If you’re in trouble during a game, you go to the side of the yard and listen to the pathetic looking tree with half-eaten apples.  This pretend-manager gives you pointers.  You look down real serious.  You listen.  You nod.  You consult like this when you’re way behind.

On Saturdays, when Andy has a game, you bring your mitt.  It’s different from when kids bring their mitts to professional games: when a kid who brings a mitt to a professional game, it's because the kid is trying to catch a ball--keep a souvenir.  That’s not what you try for at Andy’s game.  You don’t need any souvenir. (Plus, no use in catching a hardball to keep when you’re not even allowed to throw them at home: thanks, Pete!) 

No, the reason you bring your mitt to Andy’s game is completely different: you bring your mitt hoping upon hope that one day you’ll need it.  One day, Andy's baseball team might just happen to be one player short and instead of calling off the whole thing—the whole game—there’ll be some really big reason why they can’t call off the whole thing, and Andy’s coach will look into the bleachers, desperate, as he searches for some way to solve this problem.  Luckily, he’ll just happen to see you with your mitt, t-shirt, and gym shoes, ready to play!  He’ll nod you on. He’ll put you in the outfield and maybe you’ll catch the third out! Time to bat--there are two outs, bottom of the ninth, you’re up, and you know the rest. Pretty soon you’re on the cover of the local newspaper, Sports Illustrated, even People.

For your television interview, you jaunt down a lush backyard in springtime with Barbara Walters. The two of you skip happily through a field of fresh daffodils.  During a pause in the interview, you stop to pick up a flower and hand it to her.  As you do, she asks when it was you knew you were so gifted.  "Let's talk about you, Barbara," you say.  “Did you ever consider speech therapy?”

Thus the reason for the mitt.   So far, you haven’t had much luck, but bring it anyway.  The coach never seems to notice you at all, much less consider you a sub.  One time a kid came late, but the coach just planned on playing without him.

Since you go to the trouble of bringing it (the mitt), there’s a lot of time to toss a ball up in the air and catch it.  When Dad comes, sometimes he tosses with you, on the side of the ball field.  Sometimes, he looks right at you when you toss.  Sometimes he mysteriously smiles your way and you smile back.  Like Mom, you’re not sure if he’s looking at you or past you.  But sometimes you and Dad share a Moment.  Most of the time, though, he looks to see what’s going on in Andy’s game.  It’s okay.   

Mom doesn’t like it--your mitt.  She never really says this, but it’s easy to tell.  Sometimes she fixes your hair while you sit in the stands next to her.  She un-wrinkles your t-shirt and sometimes licks her finger to try to dab out a spot in your jeans, or worse, your face.  She puts her arms around you real tight. Her hugging so tight makes it hard to catch the ball in your mitt, much less throw it; she holds your arms to your side so that you can’t move and you end up suffocating both the mitt and the ball.  The ball suffocates and dies inside the mitt, despite your attempts to let it breathe.  You wonder if Mother realizes this.  You wonder if she realizes she’s killing something.