The Best Birthday Present Ever

Ella is incredibly gifted in many ways, but athletic ability is not one of them. So, when one of the second-grade moms said they were starting a softball team and asked if Ella would play, I did hesitate for a second.  But I realized that this would be good to help Ella build friendships and learn life lessons like how to lose gracefully and how to chew tobacco.

The first game went exactly like I thought it would, which was not well.  In her first at bat, she barely made contact and hit a little dribbler down the first base line.  It broke my heart when Ella got tagged out. She came back to me crying and said, “I let my team down, Daddy.”  Her second at bat did not improve as she struck out.

Her second game was even worse.  We played that team.  Everyone knows that team.  A curated team of elite athletes that take the game way too seriously for eight-year-old girls.  The team that takes extra bases on every hit even when they are up by twelve runs. We got run ruled in three innings, so Ella only got one at bat.  She struck out.

After the game, I had to deal with her disappointment and all the negative comments like “I’m terrible at softball” and “I’m never going to get a hit.”  I decided that if she never did get a hit, it wouldn’t be from a lack of effort.    

So, after the game I did what any daddy would do.  I went on a sporting goods tour. I hit Academy, Scheel’s, and Dick’s Sporting Goods buying any hitting training device I could find.  And after I installed the hitting net, our backyard looked like a makeshift batting cage.

And then we practiced hitting.  And then we practiced even more.  I had her hitting off a tee and I pitched foam practice balls to her just in case she shanked one and missed the net. A legitimate concern.

Ella’s third game was on the morning of my birthday.  After barely fouling off her first two pitches, it finally happened. She became like Neo in the Matrix. She started to believe. She didn’t get upset or frustrated and dug in ready for the next pitch. Then, she hit a hard grounder to third and started to run to first base.  She didn’t run fast (she doesn’t run fast), but she did run hard.  And when she touched first base ahead of the throw, the look of joy on her face is something I will never forget. The Cheshire Cat’s smile wasn’t half as big as Ella’s.

Three hits later, Ella touched home plate and scored her team’s first run of the game.  She made a bee line for me and gave me the biggest hug. Ella has given me thousands of hugs through the years, but that hug was in the Top Ten.  I will never forget that one.

The last inning, Ella’s team was down by three runs, and she went to bat with one runner on base and two outs.  Knowing that the next out would end the game, she said, “I don’t want to lose the game on your birthday, Daddy.”

I couldn’t make her understand that at that point I had already won the day and the final score of the game and the results of her last at bat didn’t matter to me.  She did, in fact, get a hit in her last at bat, and she finished the game going 3-3 with a run and an RBI.  But those last two at bats didn’t matter.

That first hit.  And that hug.  That was the best birthday present I’ve ever received.