Catcher's Mask

Dust and Dirt

Photo by Ben Hershey on Unsplash

I swallowed the dust from Dilly Schneider’s hand.

Never did that before,

Coaches tell ya not to headfirst slide because it’s dangerous.

When I heard “Out” I guess I opened my mouth to celebrate, surprised, thrilled, and sucked in dirt, dust and maybe sweat down the wrong pipe.

I fell back on my butt, coughing, choking really.

I remember thinking I wasn’t gonna be able to celebrate.

Celebration got put on hold.

Dilly Schneider’s father came around the fence to console him, I guess. I heard someone say that later.

Except what it looked like was that Dilly Schneider’s dad just started beating him up.

Bad.

In all that chaos, I couldn’t stand up. I was in full gear, did manage to pull my mask off, and I sat on my butt choking, kinda wishing an adult or someone would help me for the first time in my life.

I was choking and watching Dilly Schneider get punched in the face by his father ten seconds after the Moravian Construction Monarchs had clinched the Junnels Valley Championship and qualified for Regionals.

I puked infield dust and bile and got a hug from my cousin Jennifer who I didn’t even know was watching the game and some of the younger kids on the Monarchs who should have been celebrating like crazy were just standing there with bit lips and dumb not-talking shock on their faces.

Dilly was bleeding from his lip, from his own dad, not my tag, I tagged him on the elbow.

Some other dads jumped in and now Dilly was standing there watching three other dads whoop his dad’s ass.

Justin Kyler’s mom had her arm around Dilly, trying to hug him and pull him away.

The story, the much later story, was that Mr. Schneider smelled alcohol on Dilly’s breath, and Mr.Schneider went to a church that says if you drink liquor you’re going to hell. Like he was really there to console his son after Dilly was called out at home for the final out of the Junnel’s Valley Championship, presented by Timlin’s Lawncare, and when he smelled the booze he snapped because he was afraid his kid was going to hell.

We celebrated eventually, Coach Hovicki taking us to Skip Lasler’s Ice Cream Arcade.

Skip himself was there, and congratulated us. He played 3 games for the St. Louis Cardinals before I was born and that always seemed like a big deal until it didn’t.

I puked again in the bathroom of the arcade.

I didn’t feel good for three days.

A week later Sycamore Falls beat the crap out of us in the regional and sent us home.

Tom Curran and I were the only two kids who didn’t cry on the bus.

I didn’t ask Tom why he wasn’t crying because I didn’t want him to ask me back.

Right now, I feel the same kind of malaise I felt back then.

We’re in Hoppy’s, and I’m standing under the neon mascot, a drunk rabbit holding a beer mug.

Twice a year Lakepointe County honors its first responders and then everyone goes to Hoppy’s.

Some of the Algonquin Fire and Rescue guys seem like they live here.

The young guys are trying to by me shots.

When I tell ‘em no their shock reminds me of the young kids on the Moravian Construction baseball team.

At the Lakepointe County Awards they presented me with my fourth career Frank Henry Lifesaving Award.

Tyra Davison, the meteorologist from Channel 4 recounted the details of the incident in which I’m credited with saving a life after a multi-vehicle accident at 75 and Bronner Road.

They left out some stuff.

They always do.

They made it sound heroic.

They always do.

I got a standing ovation.

They always stand and applaud.

Always.

The children of Maureen Downey, the woman I’m credited with saving, were there.

Vonte Arthur was there, and he’s here in Hoppy’s somewhere.

Vonte is a great trauma paramedic. He’s got about seven Frank Henry Awards. I’ve been to his house. Never seen one displayed, but I know he’s gotten them.

He was treating the occupant of another car in the wreck.

Maureen Downey made it.

She’s paralyzed from the chest down, but she’s alive.

I didn’t do anything special. All by-the-book stuff.

No one ever believes that, no one wants to hear it.

This world needs heroes, so today I’m it.

The guy Vonte treated was never gonna make it.

His name was Dylan Joseph Schneider.

I don’t know if he believed what his father believed, but I guess not. In his tox report his BAC was twice the legal limit.

If he was alive, he’d be in prison.

But he’s not.

Vonte doesn’t know I knew Dylan Joseph Schneider.

Vonte doesn’t know Dilly slid headfirst into home in the Junnels Valley Little League Championship when I was playing catcher for the Moravian Construction Monarchs.

I search the crowd for Vonte.

The same nausea I felt back then I feel now.

When I got sober and made my amends to people I never made my amends with Dilly Schneider.

I choked on dirt that day and I guess in a way I’ve been choking on it a little ever since.

I’m gonna tell Vonte all about that day on the diamond.

And I’m gonna tell him something I never had the balls to tell anyone before.

Dilly Schneider, for a brief moment, just before his father walked on to that field, was safe.

*****