15 of 29

Write now Article Tools

Page 2 of 5

and another spring is here.

In fact, I woke up this morning to find that the crab apple tree in my front yard began leafing out last night. The 300 year old, 200 foot tall, chestnut tree in back will leaf out within the week. And my neighbour's Magnolia tree ought to be in full bloom in another three or four weeks. Then, the apple tree flowers about the time the Magnolia begins dropping its pedals. For a few weeks, my street will be awash in tree-born colour.

It is truly spring.

For example, I watched a Little League team practicing on a diamond in the park a block from my house. Neighbors pause again to chat when they meet on the sidewalk or in a store; during the winter, people expend too much energy staying warm to have time for more than a perfunctory nod and half-smile when they pass acquaintances on the street. People driving ragtops have them down, even if the heater is going full blast because it really isn't warm enough to have a 30-mile-per-hour wind chill hitting you in the face.

And best of all, it is baseball time. George Will wrote that "life begins with spring training" and I've always held that to be one of life's few truisms.

Baseball was my first love, infusing me with the kind of joy that normally only a new romance brings - and it did so a full year before I met Pamela Perlick in Grade K. Its wonderment has outlasted any other loves and lusts that have blessed and cursed me since. It still remains the only sporting event that will motivate me to sit in front of a television for a few hours to watch any of the channels here and in the States that carry games between April and October.

Baseball is in an intimate game, and in many respects Canada is an intimate country in spite of its geographical spread, so you'd think more Canadians would be hooked on baseball. Many sports are better viewed away from the action. In football, a seat at field level makes it all but impossible to really understand how a play is unfolding. I've noticed the same thing in hockey. I've sat along the boards and up in the rafters; the cheap seats actually give a better view of what was happening on the ice. The opposite is true in baseball. The game's best view is from the dirt around home plate, and the further one sits from it the slower the game seems and the less comprehensible are its moves and strategies.

For anyone reared on the lightning fast pace of hockey or the NFL, I can see why baseball appears to be so pokey and lacking any excitement. Nothing much seems

• << previous page
• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5
• next page >>

Add your voice

Know something about Essays: Spring?
We want to hear your view. Write now!