Meet Baseball Boy

I shall be referring to my 10 year old son on this blog as "Baseball Boy". As far as kids go, he's a pretty good one in my opinion!

I'm not overstretching things by calling him Baseball Boy. He loves the game - be it playing, watching, or reading about it. Maybe it is because his dad and I met in a college class called "Writing About Baseball", or maybe it's the Puerto Rican genes. Who knows? His favorite team is the Philadelphia Phillies, courtesy of his dad, but one of his favorite players is Roberto Clemente. This warms my heart to no end as he was my late father's favorite player. Sometimes I feel like my dad's spirit is with him whenever he's out there on the field...

Interestingly, it was at a baseball game that I was hit with this idea to bite the bullet and learn Spanish. We were attending a minor league game a few weeks ago and sitting behind us was a group of young men. Because of the location of our seats, we surmised they were part of the "baby" league, in other words, very recently recruited kids. I also guessed they were from the Dominican Republic. I could be wrong, but I know that's a big recruiting area for baseball talent. As I overheard them talking (I recognized one of them cursing during a botched play-lol) I was suddenly struck by the fact that once again, if I only knew Spanish, I could actually have a conversation with these guys! That's it, I am going to learn. Was it like The Voice in "Field of Dreams"? Well, not exactly BUT it was a pretty good inspiration nonetheless. Do I realize there are all these dialects and such that vary from region to region? I do, but still, I'm not ever going to assume I will be able to pass myself off as a native, I just want to communicate better.

So, as we were driving home, I casually made my little announcement. BB immediately piped up from the back seat "I want to learn with you too, Mom!". Hearing that from him was all I needed-not only was I proud and happy to hear him willingly take on this challenge (and he does know what he is getting into-he has had Spanish as a special since Kindergarten, so he does have some familiarity) I knew that if we could learn this together, it would reinforce both of our skills. I was thrilled, and I vowed right then and there that we would make this happen. I would focus on BB for now, but the Little Guy also in the back seat knew a few words in Spanish as well, and was known to use them on his preschool classmates. You'll meet him next.