My Baseball Glove

I got a new baseball glove on Monday. It's my first new glove. Yes, I, a 22-year-old baseball fanatic, has never had a baseball glove that was bought especially for me. I don't even really remember my first baseball glove, though I feel I should; it's a rite of passage that (almost) every little boy goes through. His dad gives him a glove and then teaches him to catch -- with both hands on your glove, throwing hand assisting the glove hand in keeping it closed. The dad rolls grounders to his son and teaches him to put his glove all the way to the ground. He teaches his son how to take the ball out of his glove and throw to first base. It seems every father's dream is for his son to either play the position he played as a kid, or to be a pitcher.

I remember my dad teaching me to throw, and I remember the glove -- a black glove whose model number started with an 'x', but I don't remember how I got it. But I had quite the arm for a 7 year old. (My arm still ain't bad for a non-athlete...) I barely remember my little-league days. I only remember select games: the game I went 5-for-5; the time I was playing left-field (and I was a bad outfielder then) and made a really nice catch (or as nice as a 7-year-old makes a catch look...) and the crowd (parents) didn't realize who it was because, well, I'd never made a nice catch in my life...

But here I am, now, 22, with my first glove that I can really call my own. I play softball 7 or 8 Fridays in the summer, but otherwise, this glove probably won't get much use, and that's okay. Because it isn't the glove that I love to have and use, it's what the glove signifies and symbolizes. It's me back to childhood. It's me re-joining the baseball community.

But more than anything, it's me having a new glove. And if you ask me, that's pretty cool.