Army and Baseball Brats

Though I may have been shortchanged in the brains and brawn department, I've never been at a loss for friends.  Making friends has always come easy, going all the way back to the old neighborhood. Glenn Vogel and his three brothers, the Woody kids, Nancy Haglund, Mary Tait, Scott and Rob Winter, Teddy Shea- these were the close connections of childhood, friendships forged within the 4-corner Citrus Heights comfort zone bounded by Bloom Way, Primrose Dive, Longwood Way and Kensington Drive.

 

Then there was Terry Lindsay, probably my first ever best friend. And I was his, confirmed during a lunchroom pinkie swear. We were in the second grade class at Skycrest School and, though placed on opposite sides of the room because of Mrs. Byrd’s seating chart, were instantly drawn to each other because we were both little runts, exactly the same size. So we instantly hit it off and, outside the classroom, spent recesses climbing and swinging on the monkey bars, playing tether ball and bugging the bigger kids.

 

Sometimes after school, Terry and I would play Army or one-on-one football in his backyard, two miles from Skycrest and typically innocuous and All-American boyhood diversions. But with the Lindsay house located on busy San Juan Avenue, I remain amazed to this day that my overprotective mother ever allowed me to engage in. It wasn’t so much the activities as the venue. Even then San Juan was a busy street and, though the crosswalk at Madison was controlled by a traffic light, Terry and I were 7 years old- easily prone to distractions, goofing off and taking the quickest route from point A to point B. We called it ‘dodge cars’. More specifically, a short cut. The authorities would probably refer to it as jay-walking. Oh well. The Mom’s never knew and he and I both lived to see the third grade.

 

The Lindsay's back yard stopped at an unfenced ledge that fell about 20 feet into a gully of weeds and high grass. And each time Terry or I took an imaginary bullet at the drop-off, just like a couple of pint-sized drama queens we’d always take an overplayed tumble down the slope. Oh ya got me. I’m deaadddd….The plunge was steep but the downward roll, tempered by the loose soil and thick grass was forgiving, which considerably softened the blow of getting killed. Although I never went home in clean clothes. But, oh, we were magnificent; the magnificent two. There were other times when Terry tagged along home with me. We didn't play Army at my house, though, because Mom didn't like us "shooting" at each other with our toy machine-guns. So our military maneuvers were done strictly at Terry's house.

Terry was also the first non-relative I’d ever spoken to on the telephone. Significant? Not now. But when you're 7 it is. I’d only talked to Mom or Grandma on the phone before and, only very briefly, and thought it was absolutely the coolest thing yakking with my friend from school for hours instead –or at least 15 minutes- sitting in his living room several miles away as I was sitting in ours. But it wasn’t so cool when Terry told me- also on the phone- that he was moving away. It was during the summer between second and third grade when the Lindsay’s moved away and I was down one best friend. However that was also around the time our family became acquainted with the Thome's while attending Celtic Cross Church, and I started paling around with middle son, Paul. Soon, I didn’t miss Terry as much.

 

Paul's also important because his house was my first sleep over house, the first friend I spent the night with. At that time their house was on Coyle Avenue in Carmichael, which seemed like a trillion miles from ours. Paul had stayed over at our house a couple times, but I’d yet to spend the night at his place. As much as I liked hanging around with him, the thought of sleeping away from home frightened me. I’d managed to slip out of it once but the second time Paul asked, Mrs. Thome insisted and Mom wouldn't let me beg off. So, the date was set and confirmed; the following Friday night, August 2, 1963.

 

I remember the date because it was my brother’s birthday weekend and he, or Mom and Dad- or maybe all three of them- wanted me out of the house. Regardless, unless I got pukey sick, I was goin’! But when Friday came around the fear still hadn’t dissipated, and on the drive over was so scared I thought I was going to puke. I begged Mom to take me home, but she wouldn’t listen. She did promise a spanking and grounding if I didn’t stop my belly-aching. When we got to the Thome’s- about a 15 minute drive-Paul invited me in, made me feel welcome and took me around the house and backyard, while his Mom and my Mom chit-chatted in the kitchen. In retrospect, I think this was a diversionary plan they’d all concocted because while Paul and I were in the backyard tossing a baseball, that’s when Mon left. I heard her drive away. I wanted to chase after her but didn't want Paul to think I wasn't brave. So, counter-intuitively I stayed where I was and kept playing catch.

 

When we went inside, my little knapsack of belongings, Mr.Thome had been taken from the kitchen and placed in Paul’s room. That’s when it hit me that Mom wasn’t coming back and I was there for the duration. I don’t know if I wanted to cry, but I leaned into a door jamb feeling abandoned and out of place. But Mrs.Thome offered me some cookies and a glass of milk and told me she was glad I was there and that I was going to have a good time. And guess what? She was right. After dinner and a whiffle ball game, we slept in sleeping bags in Paul’s backyard looking straight up at the stars in the summer night sky and exchanging fanciful stories about our future exploits when we both got to the Big Leagues until I dropped off to sleep. When Mon came and got me the next morning shortly after breakfast,  I didn't want to go and wondered why she’d come so early.

From then on, though, even after they moved to a bigger house in Fair Oaks, Paul and I swapped turns spending Friday night’s at each other’s houses. Friday was always The Man from U.N.C.L.E. night on NBC, Channel 3. UNCLE was an acronym for the United Network Command for Law and Enforcement and, after baseball, was our next-favorite pastime.  If we weren’t watching UNCLE we were playing it.  Tall and dark haired Paul was  Napoleon Solo (Robert Vaughn, the tall and dark haired agent); shorter and blond, I always played Ilya Kuriakyn (David McCallum, the shorter, sandy haired agent). Fighting the evil-doers from arch nemesis T.H.R.U.S.H (the Technological Hierarchy for the Removal of Undesirables and the Subjugation of Humanity), with our official replica Man from Uncle weapons and devices, Paul and I- er, agents Solo and Kuriakyn- spent many a weekend hour taking orders from Mr. Waverly back at headquarters and saving the world. It was great fun.

 

But baseball was the real draw. Whenever we got together, Paul and I could spend literally the entire time either talking baseball, trading baseball cards or catching any baseball game we could find on TV. We were baseball buddies. Our families organized outings to Giants games at Candlestick Park and when we weren’t watching the big boys from the National League play, we were playing in our own “little National" league, consisting of two teams, his and mine. But though we lived in California, neither one of us chose to emulate the Giants or the Dodgers. He was the Cardinals and I was the Cubs.

 

My abode was “Wrigley Field”, because if you used your imagination (and, as kids, that's what we did best) the shrubs around the house bore a very un-reasonable facsimile to ivy, just like the covered outfield of the real Wrigley. The short “porch” over the garage in ‘left field’ kind of mimicked the short dimensions of the real Friendly Confines. And our lights weren’t situated at all to play night games, so just like all the games at Wrigley Field in Chicago (back then anyway) all my home games were day games. Paul’s house, of course, was “Busch Stadium” renamed that way whenever I was a guest, anyway. Like the St. Louis Busch, the Thome’s backyard was bigger and harder to hit a home out of, and they did have great outdoor lighting. So we played night games there, which was a nice break from a steamy July or August afternoon game at my house.

 

At both places, we laid out a standard diamond and used a piece of plywood to act as the backstop/umpire. If a pitch hit the backstop, it was a strike. If it missed, it was a ball. The "field" at my house was fairly unencumbered, but at Paul’s we had to dodge all of their olive trees that played havoc with almost any hit ball. Needless to say, there were a lot of ground rule singles and doubles at the Thome’s “Busch” compared to my “Wrigley”. But we played the same way at both yards, a whiffle ball and a plastic bat, one pitcher and one hitter. There were no live fielders only imaginary ones. To record an out, you had to hit the batter with the ball before he got to a base which, when using a whiffle ball, is much easier said than done. But somehow it all worked. At least we made it work and with Paul’s never ending running play-by-play (Gibson into the windup and here's the pitch…. Banks hits a shot to deep left….Flood's at the track, at the wall, he looks up... and it’s gone! A home run!!), these games were some of the best parts of summer vacation.

We kept score and stats, too, but most of the games ended up a Cardinal victory for Paul. He was a head taller and older by two years, yet never treated me as the annoying little brother who wouldn't go away. We were equals. He also played organized ball so he was by far the better baseball player. In fact, I probably shouldn’t have won half the times I did, though in some cases, especially if the game was a blowout, I think- no, I know- Paul made a bunch of ridiculous errors to keep the humiliation level down and the game closer. But that's just the way Paul was; in fact it seems he always seemed to be looking out for me. Case in point-

I'd heard on one of the Giants broadcasts that, during an upcoming off day in their schedule, Tom Haller and Hal Lanier were appearing at Leighton Little John Field to conduct a baseball clinic for all Little Leaguers. And I sooo wanted to go. Not because I was a Giants fan (wasn't then, aren't now) but to meet two real ballplayers. However, I wasn't in Little League at the time and technically ineligible to attend, which definitely created a problem. But Paul was. He signed me up, probably as his little brother or something, and got me in. The whole morning was a whirlwind, but I was on the same field with Tom Haller and Hal Lanier of the San Francisco Giants! It was like they'd popped out of their baseball cards and into three-dimensional real life, standing in front of us and actually talking, not just to the crowd of 9-13 year olds, but to me!

 

I even got to take a ground ball- which I missed- but got to be one of several kids used as an example of how NOT to play the infield. Hal Lanier patiently re-positioned me but I was still too much in awe to concentrate, and didn't catch the next one cleanly either. However I did keep it on front of me, which was Lanier's main point. Of course, when the even ended 90 minutes later, I was the same crappy 10-year old ballplayer as when we’d arrived. And it was years before I’d play a half decent shortstop. But I’d had a day most little kids only dream of. I rubbed shoulders with two Major Leaguers; and none of it would’ve happened if not for Paul Thome. He was truly a great friend.

 

However childhood doesn’t last and boyhood best friends are often that for only a season. I never saw Terry Lindsay again after second grade. I have no idea what happened to him. And while Paul and I kept up on each other until our 20's, I've only seen him once in the last 25 years. He's a pastor now, and when I heard that he was, it wasn’t a major surprise. When we played ball, he didn’t swear or act up like I did when things weren’t going well. Off the field, he always seemed like a good kid, too. More importantly, Paul was just a good person; he always had a heart for other people, like me, and a sincere heart for Jesus. I saw it all the time.. So I’m sure he made the right career choice.

But I remember Paul and Terry with affection and always will. True, our days in the sun together were long ago and our interactions next to nil since. And though I can't really call them friends now, I remain grateful for the times when I could.