TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL GAME...

I have been a baseball fan for as long as I can remember. I can’t remember a time in my life where I wasn’t. As a kid, I can still remember the tiny gloves I had. I remember learning how to grip a ball more than I remember learning how to play the piano, which I actually took lessons for. I don’t remember a time when I didn’t know how to point with the glove and throw to that spot, and following through with your hand once the ball was out of it. I don’t remember learning that you always step into a pitch you are swinging at, but I don’t remember ever not knowing it. I know there are many people who don’t like baseball. They say it is boring, it drags out too long and of course the athletes can’t be as talented as their quarterbacks, their point guards, or any of the sports heroes they tout. I love sports as a whole, don’t get me wrong. I think that hockey is great, I love a good basketball game (not really professional as of late, but more college) and I may live in NY, but from August to January my heart is in San Fran with my 9ers. None of these sports will ever be able to hold a candle to baseball in my heart however, because despite the neighsayers, I see something that I feel they can’t or maybe that they won’t or don’t want to. I see that more than any sport (at least to me) baseball is poetry in motion.

To me, there is nothing more calming then watching a baseball game, few things that are as familiar. As long as I have been in love with baseball, I have been a true blue Yankees fan. I am not talking bandwagon; love the late ‘90s especially during the postseason play fan. In my youth and teen years, more often than not I was going to be found at home, not because I didn’t have things to go do or friends to hang out with, but because the baseball season is long, and if the game was on, I was watching it. I have to admit, I am not as adamant now. The season, along with preseason televised games, drags on too long, and my nights and weekends often book up as fast as the month changes. I keep appraised of the situation, and though the Yankees are often on the bottom of the scoreboard in today’s league, I always have that faithful hope that they will pull it out. I honestly wait for the next crop of minor leaguers to take the team by storm, forgetting that we don’t farm talent that much anymore; we simply try to buy it. That is a distressing turn for someone like me, who watched as the Core Four came up together through the system, and became some of the best players in the Majors.

The game as a whole seems to have changed though. When I was young and watching them, I was able to translate things they did in a much smaller since to my little league and softball games. The major leaguers used to be masters at playing small ball. Through watching not only the Yankees of the late 1990s, but the MLB as a whole, I learned how to play unselfish ball. You cannot say the same about the game today. Today, every player tries to be a hero with every play, with every swing. There are few master bunters among today’s pros because that is not what is going to make them the best. They want homers, and will settle for line drives that are doubles. I will also say you don’t see the running game today like you used to. Hustling for a close double or trying to beat out a dropped third strike was norms in past decades. Now I scream at the TV while players, Yankee and others, stand there to be tagged. NO!! Run your ass off to first, put the pressure on, make them hurry and mess up. Little ball here people, little ball.

We all used to pretend we were the clutch player who stepped to the plate and hit a grand slam to win the crucial game. That wasn’t it though. I can remember throwing a ball onto the slopping roof of the garage to practice tracing the ball angle so I could catch the pop flies, so I could read the ball no matter where it went like Bernie. I remember practicing running backwards in the outfield and diving like Paul. I remember the crack of Derek’s shoulder as we all got a reminder not to slide headfirst and for days after practicing that proper foot slide in. I remember studying the way Tino knew how that ball came off his bat and either running it out to first or making the turn for a proper chance at second. I am sorry, but I don’t see that in today’s game. It has made me step back. I don’t care if the Yankees never win another Championship again, I honestly don’t. We have enough to last most teams a lifetime, we have been lucky to have those Dynasty worthy teams. I do care that they have fallen prey to that horrible laziness. That sense of entitlement where they don’t seem to think they have to WORK for a championship. For me, a person who has always been able to escape into baseball and not have to worry about anything while the game was on, this is a horrible feeling. Of course you have to work for it. I don’t care how much you work out or how fast you run and how hard you throw. There will never be a team that can win 5 Championships in 6 years again (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000) if they don’t work for it every second of every day. They have to become like one, to move as one great single player.

I was thinking about this as I sat in Yankee Stadium last Saturday. I was standing up, cheering the last live at bat I would ever see Jeter at and I realized why even I am so emotional about his retirement, why people who are Red Sox fans, Dodger fans, and any true baseball fan are all so emotional. When the Captain walks off the field that last time, whether it is Thursday at Yankee Stadium, or Sunday, September 28^th at Fenway, he will take the official ending of an era with him. He will take the last remnants of the team that was named the Team of the Century for the 20^th Century with him. He will close the door and there will never be a way to reopen that time, to reestablish that baseball fervor. I imagine that there will be another long rambling blog more dedicated to a man who came only second to Bernie Williams as my favorite ball player growing up as the day gets closer. I haven’t sorted out my feelings on that one yet, let alone been able to put them on “paper.” What I do know is that I still love the game. I love the smells of it, the sounds of it. I will always have Bob Sheppard’s voice in my head announcing my team, calling the games I will never forget, yelling until he was horse that “Thhhhhhhhhhha YANKEEEEEEEEEES WIN.” I will always stop and smile when Sinatra sings that if he can make it there he can make it anywhere. Every time a team wins the World Series after a long drought, I will look for someone to jump in joy on the back of a police horse.

Lastly, I will always take the lessons I learned in baseball through life with me. I will always follow through. I will always keep my eye on the ball, literally and proverbially. I will focus early so I can learn to read my opponent moves. I will always back up my teammates and be as unselfish as I can, knowing that all I do must be first for the good of whatever “team” I am doing it for, secondly worrying about myself. As I try to get back into the game as a fan, I have to remember the past as the best era for myself, and seek out new nuances and talents that the previous teams didn’t have, and look for old habits to shine through. I did not just reminisce and see what today’s game lacks (in my opinion) when I was at the Stadium. I remembered something vital – I remembered that I love the game. That frustrated or not with aspects of it, the game to me is the apex game out there, and that I want to introduce my young nieces and nephews to the joy of it. I want to see their faces when they get their first hit, and when they catch that first pop up. I want them to look forward to the All-Star game, and yes even to live and die by their team’s wins and losses. To be a fan like that, to be a part of the culture – I wish that for them, and I can’t wait to bring it to them. Unless of course they choose to like the Red Sox. Then I will shun and mock them mercilessly, of course.

My True Coming Out Story

I recently fully came out of the closet. Not about being a lesbian. I have been out about that for varying times to different people, but the final coming out of that particular closet was a decade ago. No, no people (AKA you Sardynski). To actual come out of the closet about my sexual orientation was actually not overly scary as a whole. I knew from my past history that my family would love me no matter what. Frankly, there was no one who was truly that shocked. My true coming out story has happened within the past 12 months. It was terrifying and honestly drew more derisive looks and questions then embracing my gay self...I, Heather Marlette, am a geek. Yes, I hid the full fledged geekiness of me until I was 31. How horrible is that? Sadly, the lesbian thing was totally more accepted.
Lets get one thing straight right now. I have recently decided to be me out in the open and let my geek-flag fly high, unobstructed and proud. Keep it straight though, it is a geek flag, not nerd-pride my friends. I know that some people do not know there is a difference, do not think there is a difference, and most of all do not care. If you are one or the other though, you do. The word nerd has only truly been around since it was used in the 1950's in the Dr. Seuss book If I Ran the Zoo. It was around this time that the word passed into pop culture and was applied to those people who were seen as rule followers or a "drip/square." It has become what it is today to be applied to anyone who is not just socially awkward but completely socially inept and who is off the charts smart - more known as intellectual, studious or an expert. This is not me.
Now the word geek, this has been around in terminology as well as pop culture since the early 1900's. Geek is derived from the German geck which describes a fool/freak - this was applied in that time usually to "freaks" in side shows. Currently, geek is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as "knowledgeable and obsessive enthusiasts" who are often "unfashionable or socially inept." In today's culture, geeks are often seen as intelligent people who escape reality by being super fans of MMORPGs, Sci-Fi and fantasy. Yup. I enjoy Star Trek, but I love Star Wars...as stated in my profile, I believe it is not a movie, but a way of life. I follow the path of the Jedi, institute the Philosophy in my everyday life, and watch the movies once a month...even Episode I. I read LOTR on an annual basis, I have an opinion on the best Doctor (and if you get that, you simply get that) and I have the added bonus of being a girl so I not only think that FireFly was of the best and most under rated shows ever, I watched it because I loved Joss Whedon who brought power to my world by creating an entire generation of empowered GEEK GIRL culture which I have lived since 1996. I watched that premiere live, and never looked back - and yes I own Buffy seasons 1 -  7 on DVD, Angel seasons 1 - 5 on DVD and have Buffy seasons 8 and 9 in comics...and yes, I actually say and mean the phrase, ooh I am totally going to the comic book store tonight.
I have a favorite Avenger, X-Man, and Guardian of the Galaxy. I know the origins of Batman, Superman, Captain America and the Fantastic Four. I know the difference between Uncanny, Amazing, Ultimate, Avenging and innumerable other "versions" of superheroes. I do like Banner when he is angry. I knew who Hawkeye and the Black Widow were before Joss Whedon's film, and S.H.I.E.L.D. was not new to me, but felt like finally seeing the puppets behind the stars getting some praise. I have a favorite Batman, and I have a favorite version of the bat mobile.
Yes, I am a geek. I love being out about it. I love that I no longer hide it. I hate that I feel more accepted about living in today's society as a woman married to another woman then as a woman who does not feel it is wrong to be out about my Yoda worship. You may read this and say that I am crazy - in today's world it is cool to be a geek. I agree. If you are a male geek. Even at that, I think people like to say it and are not openly mean to geeks or nerds in today's world because they know that in the tech-filled world of today, you may need to stay on our good side. Being a geek is like everything else though - even with the limited or fake acceptance it will come to the males first, but we females will get there eventually.
So that is my true coming out story, for those few who may not know. I am a geek, I own it and I love it...haters be damned.

Well, how about that?

So, I haven’t written in awhile. Really, I have no excuse other than, you know, life. However, recently I have been doing some thinking about that. I love to write, I love to blog and I love to unapologetically be the person who is not consumed by my career. I love to be the big nerd in the room, who honestly believes it is not what you do for a living but what you do for humanity that is what defines you. Now I have to apologize to my readers (Kristen Sardynski – I say readers, we all know it is just you). I have to apologize to myself as well, because I haven’t been living my life by my own rules lately. I haven’t. I have been the person consumed by my job. Why? I don’t know. I want to say it is because I have my dream job, saving the world one person at a time, making differences in people’s lives and being the best in a world comprised of those just trying to be less bad then the really evil people. This simply isn’t true. I push papers for a living. Worse even to my young idealist self, I push papers for a big box America Fortune 100 company.

Do NOT get me wrong. My company is amazing. They honestly are. They take care of their employees, from the beginning of your career to the time you die, when they take care of your beneficiaries, no matter your age. I am lucky to have the employer I have, as they honestly believe in Corporate Responsibility. Also, it is one of the friendliest LGBTQA companies around. For all this, I am grateful. Every day. I am, however, able to say as great as it is, it is not me. It is not me at all.

This is why I do apologize. I apologize to anyone who does read my blogs. I apologize to anyone who I have ignored or been distant to and I intensely apologize to myself. I lost my way. I got caught up because I do love my employer, and I do not hate my job. Which is interesting don’t you think? It’s not that I love my job and it is not that I am even passionate about it. It is not that I wake up in the morning with a burning desire to go into work to do what I do. I like my job. That is it. Such a small thing for someone who used to believe someday she would change the world. That realization brought my thought process around to the issue that I think is why I threw myself into work to begin with. There is a moment in everyone’s life when they doubt their beliefs in some form and I do believe that is what happened to me – a kind of existential crisis if you will.

Now, for anyone who knows me there might be rolling their eyes at the Psych 101, or some may still cling to the belief that to have an existential crisis it has to be some kind of religious based faith crisis. Still others may go, you were fine through engagement, marriage, you were fine through all that your family has been through in recent years, and those are the main existential crisis stimulators…what the hell. Well, trust me I have had that thought process as well. I honestly believe that a culmination of many factors contributed, but none more than getting what I laughingly refer to as my “big kid job.”

It was easy to realize that after a string of administrative jobs that ranged from really great to you know, HELL, I was at a great company that cared and was willing to develop me. For somebody who graduated with an Associate’s degree and a Bachelors degree with high GPAs, who then bounced from one entry level job to below entry level to ridiculous, this was crazy to me. I have issues that I am dealing with in this job, and the main one is that past. I feel no matter what I am going to get the last one hired first one fired speech – I tell myself we are not a small mom and pop company, or a flailing not-for-profit. I try to calm down. I then panic that I am going to reach the end of my contract with no funds to renew it…but wait, I am not a contractor. So then I think that maybe there will be some ridiculous reason, and start to panic. This is still a weekly occurrence, at least up to about a week ago.

Then I realized the big difference. This isn’t a “big kid job.” This is…GULP…a career. That TERRIFIED (and frankly still terrifies) me. I think that is why it happened. I am not someone who has ever cared what anyone thought about me, and have never need approval from those closest to me, let alone society in general. I never cared if I was part of the group or not, didn’t have any need or want to be the “cool” kid. Then, I was at this place that seemed to care if I felt well trained, that rewarded you for doing things above and beyond, that saw you volunteered regularly and brought attention to the fact that the company has a whole volunteer program. I had the opportunity to get educated in my industry – and my company pays for it. I admit I got sucked into being the person who was defined by what I do for a living. It was fine at first, because I love my company, I love my co-workers, I adore my management team beyond what most people would find acceptable…and more than that I respect them. My direct supervisor is honestly one of the best men I know, and his wife and daughter are honestly kind and wonderful people. For the first time only, not only do I feel like I have a secure place to work, but I feel like I have a family at work, and it is nice.

Then, I got unhappy. My feelings about my job did not change, except to maybe get better. So at this point I was forced to ask what the problem is. It took over 8 months to realize…I had completely abandoned me. My true self, my true personality. I am not sure at this point if anyone else ever noticed, or if they did if it was as big a deal to them as it is to me. I am awake and aware now. I am ready to be me again. I am learning how to be me with the fact that I do have this new reality, this career. How can I adapt this into who I have always been? How can I mold this Fortune 100 Company that has a system in place that doesn’t adapt to individuals easily into the life of who I have always been? What other realizations that at 31 have I come to?

Well, we will find out. As a blog that started with me writing about things that interested me and that I am excited about and want to share my passion on, it will now be more. I think that I am not the only person who has ever felt like this, who has ever had this particular loss of identity and reawakening. So, though I am getting back to it, and you will again have to read about Sharks, LGBTQA rights, and a whole plethora of nerdy goodness you can’t even imagine, be prepared. There will be more like this. It is easier for me to figure it out when I put it down in writing, and if I am going to write it, I may as well post it right?

It is going to be interesting.