Happy Pitchers and Catchers Day!

I’m not totally sure Pitchers and Catchers Day is today for the Mariners. Some sources say today, some say tomorrow. It also might have been yesterday? I don’t know how to find information since I’ve left Twitter. It feels like it’s a little less of a “thing” now that players often report early or spend the whole winter in Arizona. Whatever day it is, I do like that it’s always close to Valentine’s Day. What better way to celebrate love than with the return of baseball?

I don’t have much for you today. This entire year has been absolutely brutal in terms of illness in our house. I mentioned before I had covid at the beginning of the year. I recovered and had about a week, then my husband got covid. At the tail end of his bout with covid one kid brought home a stomach bug and the other brought home a nasty cold and I got both. Both those have cleared up, but now both my husband and I have strep (which I also had last spring). Have kids they said, it’ll be fun they said. You’ll constantly be sick with diseases you didn’t even know you could get as an adult, they somehow failed to mention.

So, the struggle has been incredibly real over here. I think when the antibiotics have done their work we’re gonna have a whole other New Year’s Celebration and start the year over mentally. I have so many newsletters planned out and it’s been very frustrating not being able to get to them. I’ll have more content coming your way soon! I hope. I shouldn’t promise anything, given the way this year has gone.

For now, this little feeling of hope is enough. That I’ll feel like a functional person again. That winter will fade away. That baseball will be back.

I love the way baseball aligns itself with the seasons, and how the blossoming of spring collides with the hope of a new baseball year. We’re not quite to spring, but there are signs all around that we’ll get there. Tulip leaves beginning to poke up out of the ground, cherry blossom buds sprouting on trees. The hours of daylight slowly stretching. I drive by the University of Puget Sound sports fields on the way back from getting the kids at school because they like to see which teams are out practicing. We’ve seen the baseball team out for weeks now, but lately they’ve switched from hoodies and sweats into real baseball uniforms and full team practices.

Whatever it is I feel about the Mariners’ offseason (and I’ll grudgingly admit that they did get better on paper), I can’t wait to see what Julio is going to do this year. And maybe, just maybe, there will be a fun playoff run. No matter how awful the business of baseball may be, there’s always magic on the field.

I’ve often felt cynical about baseball, and particularly so the last few years. I enjoy these days were I feel romantic about it.

Happy Valentine’s Day, baseball <3