Screen Time, Take 17: Pastimes (2024)

Because I was taller than everyone else on my fifth-grade baseball team, my strike zone was slightly larger than most. That fact alone must have led to a few more pitches going unanswered when I was at bat. It also didn’t help that I was deathly afraid of the ball.

My dad, not the biggest sports enthusiast, took the time in the evenings after work both during and after baseball season to toss small plastic whiffle balls (about a 6th of the size of a regular baseball) at me that I would then swat a sad few feet from where we stood in the front yard. He was always in his dress clothes, and as the sun set behind him, it felt like everyone in our neighborhood was hiding inside during our 10-minute drill.

“Keep your eye on the ball.” he’d say before underhand tossing the practice pitch, having no idea the reason I had watched the last 9 strikes in one game pass the plate in front of me wasn’t an inability to see the ball coming, but the exact opposite: I saw it flying right at me and was frozen by fear.

Recently, I found the baseball cards they’d made for our rec teams. There I am smiling, bat in hand, not an inkling of fear on my face since I was staring down a camera and not a pitcher. The back of the cards featured my weight, height, and various stats, including 0 RBIs. The more impressive numbers reported: I had jumped from 5’1” to 5’11” over three summers.

Being tall at 12, and remaining relatively tall until most kids caught up with me in high school, had its advantages. I played center in basketball and rarely had to jump for a rebound, I was a decent first baseman because I wasn’t afraid of a ball when I had a mitt to catch it in, and adults, simply by virtue of my being the same size as them, mistakenly talked to me as if I were a peer.

“The problem with this f*cking place…” the new head of my community theater confided in me as I sat in the box office and handed a parent her change, “is there are too many chefs!” My new boss kept her flat black hair short and wore fat earrings. She was in her mid-50s and had been given the job after the board fired her friend and colleague of 15 years from the same position. Our new leader had spent much of her career teaching children how to sing in harmony, not fundraising and attending advertising meetings, and she was adjusting. I was 11 or 12, hearing an adult woman vent for the first time about what I had assumed was a nice promotion.

“It’s like that pasta fundraiser we did,” she continued, “Everyone brought in a sauce from home, but imagine if we had mixed them all together? You bring your grandma’s famous recipe in and dump it in with a bunch of Ragu, what does it taste like? It all tastes like Ragu, you know?”

I nodded as if I knew. “I get you.” I said, speaking slowly so my voice didn’t crack. I had recently visited New Orleans and had tried to yell something funny at my family while crossing the street, and out came a high-pitched whistle instead. A man in a suit walking past us mirthfully smiled to himself, knowing exactly what had happened. Since then, I remained cognizant of how deep I needed to keep my voice to not slip. Plus I wanted this woman to keep speaking to me like a coworker. “You don’t want to be watered down.”

“Yes. It’s like that. Imagine that for every person who brought in Ragu, someone else brought in a bottle of piss to mix in. That’s what the board meetings are like. Their ideas are like piss mixed into a pasta sauce.”

I giggled and quickly cleared my throat before saying in a deep voice: “Tell me about it.”

The disadvantage of tallness was that from 3rd to 6th grade, it was assumed that I could do everything myself. They started asking for tall guy favors. Tiny teachers asked me to retrieve supplies from high shelves and old ladies I didn’t know stopped me on the street and asked me to help carry their groceries from their cars. No one was worried about a boy who looked 18 at age 11, but that also meant I had to desperately seek out the right friends if I wanted to talk about Pokémon and anime instead of someone asking if I could buy them p*rn or cigarettes or firecrackers. Still, like many kids, I wanted to be older than I was and I relished my tall kid privilege. I walked to the mall alone, I walked into R-rated movies without anyone on staff stopping me, and I stood outside the back entrance of my community theater where the director and crew members smoked cigarettes and talked to them about their love lives. Never in my life did older people cover their mouths after they swore or steer conversations away from sex at the sight of me.

This early independence may have been what my parents wanted.

“We treated you like little adults even though we knew we weren’t supposed to.” My mom revealed to me on a recent trip to see my family in North Carolina. In the open-concept house down the street from where my brother settled after college, we reminisced about Cleveland from afar, my brother chiming in periodically to say how our old neighborhood had changed for the better, what buildings had been demolished and rebuilt because they were a lost cause. Schools had been turned into suburban developments, dilapidated gyms became giant complexes for rec soccer leagues, and a bunch of f*ck-up alcoholics we’d known in school had become successful lawyers (who still drank too much).

“We let you decide where we ate and what sports you played,” my Mom continued, “you weren’t supposed to let kids decide all that, even in the 90s.”

My dad, half-awake in a recliner, said that when he told a friend how he used to leave his 11-year-old alone to make sure his 8-year-old son got the school bus on time every morning, and the friend said that practice was tantamount to child abuse. Whatever trauma I experienced from having time alone with my brother (?) fails to compare to how I feel about adults who spoke to me from age 10-15.

By the time I was a teenager, I’d fully accepted my early adulthood. When I wasn’t playing a sport or acting in a play, my number one hobby was taking a John Updike book (sorry) to a coffee shop. I frequented a place within walking distance of my house in Cleveland called Talkies. I sat at the front bar with my book and ate a second lunch at 3 PM. I talked to random people sipping coffee and smoking cigarettes inside. One was a researcher at Case Western who studied molecular biology. He seemed to know no one in Cleveland except me and the baristas. Another guy was a white dude with dreadlocks, a gifted actor who bussed tables at the fancy restaurant next door. Every barista was a 20-something woman who told me about their various trysts in graphic detail. Multiple times the men offered me cigarettes or to split a joint outside. No wonder it took me years to finish one of the Rabbit novels. I was soaking up more than enough adult content in my real life than any book could offer.

The oddest encounter occurred at a hotel in Annapolis, Maryland when I was 15. I attended a boys’ catholic prep school and because my parents and I were taking a few college campus tours during our family trip, and you never know who you might bump into, I chose to wear the tie and khakis I would normally wear in class. I had chosen an aqua shirt with a bright textured gold tie that morning and was still wearing it when I approached the front desk that evening. I promised my English teacher I would have a late assingment on his desk Monday morning despite my travel schedule. I had finished writing it on my mom’s laptop and put it on a flash drive.

“Is there an office in the hotel with a printer?” I asked the woman at the front desk. I deepened my voice. “My boss needs this report ASAP.”

The woman behind the desk wore a maroon and beige polo shirt with the name of the hotel embroidered on one side and a fat plastic name tag that read “Jess” on the other. She kept her curly brown hair tied back behind her head and looked like she was ready to take a nap rather than help one more jerk fix his malfunctioning room key or find the hotel’s office. She smiled though and led the way. We walked through a large banquet hall that looked like it was hosting a wedding or prom. Pink uplighting and one of those whirling balls with differently colored light filters spun around and painted the room. I watched fat white men in suits sip co*cktails out of plastic cups and flirt with young women half their size and age. A number of them wore saris.

“What is this?” I said aloud.

“It’s a party for the IMF.” the woman said. “You’re not with them?”

“No, I’m on a different kind of work trip.” I said.

She kept walking until we found a door on the side of the room. Bright tube lighting poured into the mock nightclub when she opened it. I hurried in so as to not disturb the party atmosphere too long, and to my surprise, she shut the door behind us and stayed to watch me use the office.

Computers in 2002, especially out-of-date communal ones used by everyone in a hotel, were not very fast. The fat glass monitor was already on, and when I opened the browser, I had a good two minutes to chat, which the hotel employee seemed keen on doing.

“So where are you headed?” She asked.

“Well, it’s here tonight, then New York, then upstate somewhere, back to Cleveland.”

“Busy weekend.”

“Yes, we’re- I’m trying to squeeze in a lot.”

We talked about my work. I vaguely said I was on a deadline for a writing assignment which made me sound like a journalist or someone with an entry-level publishing job. At some point, she said she was glad I wasn’t with the loud bankers because I seemed too nice and cute to work with them.

Was this happening?

I found my little essay about Chaucer and clicked print. As a printer the size of a Fiat whirred to life and started pumping out the pages, the woman said:

“I’m actually off the clock now if you want to have a drink with me.”

“I’d love that,” I said.

I put the essay in a folder (not a professional manila folder, a high school-ass, bright glossy blue folder with my school’s logo on it) and followed her to the hotel bar.

I ordered a beer in the annoying fake way people do in movies: the actor walks up to the bar and instead of checking what’s on tap or thinking of their brand of choice like ‘Bud’ or ‘Stella’ or even naming a type like ‘stout’ or ‘pilsner’ the actor confidently says “I’ll have a beer” and the extra playing the bartender wordlessly gets to pouring.

“I’ll have a beer!” I said to the bartender who squinted his eyes at me and co*cked his head.

“OK…” he pointed at Jess, who still had her uniform and name tag on.

“Jack and co*ke, Ben.”

I sipped the beer slowly. We drank and talked about work and if Jess was going to bite the bullet and go to grad school. She asked if I wanted, when we finished our drinks, to go with her to a house party up the street.

“We can smoke a bowl, listen to my friend play some music. It’ll be fun.” she assure me.

“I really shouldn’t,” I said, “We’re- I’m… I have an early morning.”

“Ah,” she said, looking down at her drink.

I now realize that every coy excuse I made sounded like I had a girlfriend or wife at home and I maybe had a problem with drugs and alcohol that might make me do something I regretted.I was playing an adult better than I ever had in my life.

“So, someone is with you in your room, then?” Jess asked nervously.

“Yeah. There are people in my room.”

And here, dear reader, I’m sorry (or happy) to tell you that I fessed up.

“I’m staying with my parents.” I said.

“Oh. That’s sweet. Are they meeting up with you on this trip? Where are they from?”

“We drove here together from Cleveland, actually.”

“Oh, OK.” She said, looking confused.

“I- You see. I’m not on a work trip. I’m seeing schools.” I looked at the bartender who was pretending not to listen on the other side of the empty bar.

“Grad schools?”

“No. Listen. Sorry. I’m in high school.”

“Wait- how old are you?”

“I’m 15.”

“Jesus. Uuughh!” She leaned her torso over the bar as if she was fainting, and looked up at me with one eye over her glass. “Oh, boy. I know how to pick ‘em.”

“I look older,” I said, consolingly.

“Yes. You do. Oh, God. Wow. OK. Ummm.” She sat up and did a little drum roll with her hands on the bar.

I chugged the rest of my beer.

“Do you want another?” she asked automatically.

“I really shouldn’t.” I said, still playing the part of a busy, likely-married salesman who had an early flight to catch the next morning.

“Listen.” She laughed. “Fifteen. OK.” She sighed. “You should still come to the party if you want. It’ll be fun.”

I thought in my head how I would explain to my parents that I had left the hotel with a strange woman in a city I’d never visited and was now at a party with adults giving me drugs and booze, and I decided… it wasn’t worth the risk.

“Nah, I shouldn’t. I really do have to get up early.” I said.

“With your parents.”

“Yes.”

“To see some colleges.”

“And New York City!” I added.

“Right. Well, this was nice!” She reached her hand out to me and I gave her a firm handshake as if I had sold her a used car we both knew was a lemon.

I rewatched Defending Your Life (1991) this week. Albert Brook and Meryl Streep fall in love in purgatory, where the sole virtue that matters when judging a human life is bravery. In the movie, the dead are forced to watch the most embarrassing moments of their lives on a movie screen: times you didn’t stand up to bullies, times you made bad investments, and so on. The funniest part of the film is a montage of the dumbest misjudgments Albert Brooks’ character makes during his life, including falling off a roof and accidentally destroying stuff in his yard with a chainsaw.

In the movie, if you’re not deemed brave enough, you’re sent back to Earth to try again and lead a less fear-based life. Fortunately or unfortunately, I don’t have to wait for death to rewatch all the embarrassing mistakes I’ve made in life out of fear. Every time I shower, when I have no music on, no screens to read, nothing in there but myself and soap (and maybe a black coffee), I will replay moments from my life that make me cringe. Every time I’m adding shampoo to my hair, I wince, remembering a time someone was flirting with me and I missed it, every time I put my foot in my mouth, and every party I skipped out of anxiety or laziness, especially that one in Annapolis at 15. I’m not upset that I didn’t con a woman into doing something illegal, but it would be nice to have gone to the party simply to find out how weird the night would get. I didn’t go because I was scared. I wasn’t scared to drink in a hotel bar my dad could walk into at any moment, but I was scared to walk down the street with a woman who liked me.

I also often replay the scene where I decided to quit playing baseball in Fifth Grade.

The boys on my team had gathered before practice. With no baseballs to hit, they decided to swing at some small rocks they found in the dirt. If there’s one thing I remember about being an adolescent boy, it’s not giving a f*cking how you damage nice stuff a parent gave you. We were denting and scratching brand-new aluminum bats. We practiced in our uniform which we were scuffing up with grass stains for no reason by wrestling and practicing slides. Seven of us had arrived early and we took turns at bat, save for the obese kid who played a Game Boy on the bleachers. I envied him. He truly did not care about the sport, and his single mom, an overly tan thin blonde woman who was likely in her mid-thirties but seemed ancient to me as an 11-year-old, sat perched a few rows behind her son. She didn’t encourage him to join the pre-practice fun. She was simply there, smiling at us, unnecessarily collecting more sun.

A kid I had played football with that past fall was deaf in both ears and whenever he tilted his head, his hearing aids whistled. He stood at second base behind the pitcher, and between screams of laughter, he pulled his chin and tried to crack his neck. Each time, I heard the high-pitched chirp from his ears. He stood between the bag and his bike he’s dropped hurriedly on the ground. Even if someone ran the bags after a hit, they would have to leap over a neon Schwinn or two. The rowdiness of semi-supervised 5th graders in the summer also meant you would likely face someone trying to tackle you as you rounded the bases. No one was going to attempt to field the rocks. This was an maginary baseball game with Lord of the Flies-esque rules.

The pretty boy pitcher who could throw 45 miles an hour and had knocked a few out of the park that season, smiled at me. He picked up a rock about the size of the wiffle balls my dad used to help me practice, and instead of a light toss, he whipped the sucker overhand. Intentionally or not, the rock connected with my ribs. I dropped my bat and walked to the back fence. There was no catcher there. I stood alone clung the fingers of my right hand to the metal gate. I held my left hand awkwardly against my side, my body forming into an inverted little teapot stance in a freshly-cleaned green and white baseball uniform. I was chum to my peers.

I turned to see the pitcher cackling and looking at the near-cloudless sky. “A ball would have hurt worse, Wilbur.”

I hissed like I’d stubbed a toe and removed my hand from the fence to give a thumbs up. I walked back to the plate to get the bat and noticed the first and second baseman had moved closer. Both of them had something in their throwing hands.

The pitcher, noticing what his friends were doing, gleefully picked up a flat stone. They all had picked rocks that you could skip across a pond. They weren’t trying to stone me to death. They were trying to get a rise out of the worst player on their team. A dork the size of their coach who needed a dressing down for being so afraid of baseballs.

They threw the rocks as fast as they found new ones (My brother assured me that Fairview Park has invested in its baseball diamond upkeep since then). I pinned myself against the fence and curled halfway to the ground, covering my face whenever I saw another windup. I’d look up at them to say stop, then ducked behind my hands again as more rocks came at me.I heard the rocks whizzing by my ears between short bright sounds of the second baseman’s hearing aids.

“Stop! I’m serious.” (Never a good defense if you’re appealing to tween boys’ empathy).

The rocks kept coming. They hit my legs and ribs and ass. My face was flush now. I looked over to the bleachers and saw the obese boy. He’d stopped playing Game Boy to watch. His face showed no emotion.

As the rocks hit me, I looked up to his mom, who was laughing and shrugging with a sort of “boys will be boys, what can you do?” expression on her face.

“Hey,” I said. “Can you ask them to stop?” She shrugged again. “They’re actually f*cking hurting me!” I said, hoping the language was enough to let her know I needed help. I’m almost certain a mom of any stature at that moment could have yelled “STOP” and the boys would giggle but know they’d face consequences of some kind if they didn’t reel it in.

Instead, she laughed.

“I’m serious, you f*cking bitch.” (Not helpful but I was trying to relay my panic as more rocks hit my face and legs and the boys got closer.)

Once it was obvious they did not intend to stop of their own volition, it occurred to me that I was bigger than every player on the team. I stood up and ran towards the pitcher, rocks hitting my chest and face. I hoped the rage would show and they’d stop out of fear. But they all became matadors, and I was the bull who couldn’t make contact. I grabbed the pitcher’s shirt by the collar and tried to land a punch. He pulled away and ran in the other direction. The deaf second baseman was backing up but still whipping rocks as he looked both ways, deciding how he’d evade a tackle. I arrived at the bag and lifted his bike over my head a chucked it like a shot put to my right, anticipating which way he would dodge. I was correct and it’s the only good retaliation I managed. He kid fell on the ground, then scuttled away into the open field as I chased him.

More rocks, but everyone kept their distance. We found a pattern where I sprinted toward anyone who dared reach for the dirt, and that kid would scatter back before being able to rearm himself. We kept this up for another five minutes until a coach arrived, a balding man with the body of a Sneetch who had a voice better suited for directing kids’ musical theater than kids’ sports. Still, his scream reversed the spell. The boys ran for home plate to start practice as if nothing was happening. Exhausted, panting, I walked toward the bleachers. I sat on the top row as far from the kid and his mom as I could. I put my head in my hands, and wept.

With my coach’s permission, I rode my bike home and skipped practice. I could hear him lecturing the other players as I rode off past the yellow brick hut with bathrooms and a pay phone on the front where I probably should have stopped to call my parents to pick me up. Instead, I rode on the sidewalk of the loud four-lane street for two miles back to my house. By the time I got home, my coach had already called my parents from that phone to explain the situation.

My dad was sitting in the backyard by his pond practicing chords on his acoustic guitar when I arrived. He put the guitar aside but remained on the old wooden bench so I could sit on his lap.

How silly it must have looked to someone passing by: a 6-foot dude dressed in a little boy’s baseball uniform, complete with a cheap snapback cap set on its widest notch, sitting on the knee of a man his same size.

My dad looked me in the eye and asked quietly: “Why did it upset you so much?”

“Because they were my teammates,” I said as I scrunched up my face. He bounced me on his knee and rubbed my back as I sobbed.

He was the only person who treated me like a kid that day.