Monday, June 14, 2010

A New World (One Sixty-Two: Day 53)

Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.

Day Fifty-Three: Torii Hunter, Los Angeles Angels

Maeve doesn’t need to get ready for work. She has no homework to do. There are no bills for her to pay.

Just food, sleep, baths and a big ol’ world to discover. Such is the life of a 2-month-old.

Maeve is placed on a blanket on the floor, and she lies on her back and looks up at you. As you whisper hellos to her and give her little legs a gentle tap, she responds with a million different variations of the human smile. There’s the wide-eyed wonder smile, the laugh-out-loud, head-turned-to-the sky smile, the sneaky, lips-pursed smile – and, of course, the occasional gas-induced smile.

So new to this life of hers, Maeve is opening her eyes each day and absorbing the world with a joy that is impossible for us to fully understand. As a friend of her parents, I get to see that joy when we visit (as we did yesterday). But for Mom and Dad, Maeve’s growth is more fascinating than anything they’ve ever seen. Even Maeve’s dad, a die-hard baseball fan, has never seen anything like it. Her eyes cover more ground each day than Torii Hunter does in centerfield for the Angels. Just as Hunter glides around the vast expanse of green in pursuit of fly balls, Maeve studies all the people and things she can see and tries to make sense of them. This week, her new discovery is ceiling fans. They rotate! They make wind! They keep rotating! They make more wind!

Maeve will one day carry a backpack, and a briefcase, and a stack of bills. Life will bring her there soon enough. But right now, she’s just got faces, and sunlight, and ceiling fans to study. Lots to cover for such a new world. And lots to smile about - for both the child and her parents.

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