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Michael Fox CPCC,
founder of m·agine!,
is a professional
coach and trainer,
author and creative artist, whose work has been featured throughout
the world.
Michael is a
Certified Practitioner
of the
Myers-Briggs
Type Indicator.®
Do you know someone
who might benefit
from our weekly email?
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Crystal clear recollections...
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In his remarkable autobiography--or, more precisely, tribute to his father--700 Sundays, Billy Crystal recalls Wednesday, May 30th, 1956. It was the day his father took Billy and his brothers to their first baseball game, a doubleheader between the Washington Senators and the New York Yankees at fabled Yankee Stadium.
"We were in Nellie [the family's 1948 Chevrolet, M. FOX] driving under the elevated subway of Jerome Avenue, and the sun was playing peek-a-boo with the railroad tracks. We pulled into the parking lot. We got out and I said, 'Where's the field, Pop?'
"He pointed to the stadium. 'There.'
"I said, 'In that building?'
"He said, 'Yeah. Come on, guys. Let's go. Hurry up. Come on. Let's go.'
"I held on to the back of Dad's sport jacket, and we ran to the stadium with my brothers behind me. And as we got closer to the stadium, we got more excited. 'Tickets, please. Yearbooks here. Programs. Tickets, please. Hey, there you go, sir.'
"The ticket taker rubbed my head: 'Enjoy the game little man.'
I'm in the concourse of the stadium now. Men in white shirts and ties on their way to a hot Memorial Day doubleheader. I'm eight years old, and I grab on to Pop's hand, as we walk through one of those passageways toward the field. It was so dark, you couldn't see anything, but you could smell it. The smell of hot dogs and beer, mustard, relish, and pickles embedded in the concrete ever since the days that the great Babe Ruth had played there.
"And then, suddenly, we were there. The enormous stadium, the blue sky with billowing clouds that God hung like paintings over its triple decks, which in turn hovered over an emerald ocean. The people in the bleachers, seemingly miles away, would be watching the same game we would be. The three monuments sitting out here in deep centerfold, three granite slabs with brass plaques on them for Lou Gehrig, Miller Huggins and The Babe, and I thought they were actually buried in the outfield. The players in the classic pinstripe uniform, the interlocking NY over their hearts, running, throwing, laughing with each other, as if they were knights on a mystical field.
Dad took out his eight-millimeter camera to take movies so that we would never forget. But how could you? How green the grass was, the beautiful infield, the bases sitting out there like huge marshmallows, the Washington Senators in their flannel uniforms warming up on one side, and the Yankees taking batting practice on the field. The first time I heard the crack of the bat. It was so glorious. We had a black and white TV, so this was the first game I ever saw in color...
"In the fourth inning, Mickey Mantle, Elvis in pinstripes, twenty-five years old, in his Triple Crown summer, batting left-handed, off Pedro Ramos, hit the longest home run without steroids in the history of Yankee Stadium. It went up through the clouds and struck off the facade of the once mighty copper roof...Later, Mickey hit a triple, and he rumbled into third base and pulled himself up like a runaway mustang. And there he was right in front of me, No. 7, in the afternoon sun."
Regrettably, I can't remember the first major league baseball game I attended; in fact, I can't remember--forgive my errant grammar--having ever not visited beautiful Dodgers Stadium in Chavez Ravine, overlooking the Los Angeles skyline, a couple of times a year. But if Billy Crystal's memory can be compared to a Rembrandt portrait of striking, near photographic, detail, then my memory can be compared, perhaps kindly, as a Monet Impressionistic landscape...
I recall moments.
Willie Mays patrolling center field...Willie Stargell hitting a home run over the right field pavilion...Passing Casey Stengel and Babe Herman in a corridor following an "Old-Timers' Game...Watching Dizzy Dean enter the press box...My first ball game "out of town" at San Francisco's Candlestick Park...Taking Kevin and Daniel--and, later, Andrew--to their first ball games. Cal Ripken hitting a home run to left field in old Yankees Stadium...Singing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" at Chicago's Wrigley Field and "Sweet Caroline" at Boston's Fenway Park...The Angels' Devon White stealing second, then third, then home...Watching the Cubs play the Dodgers from Lew Wasserman's dugout seats at Dodgers Stadium...A congratulatory message on the scoreboard from the Brooklyn Dodgers' Zach Wheat to the Los Angeles Dodgers' Willie Davis...A slender slugger from USC named Mark McGwire playing in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics...Fernando Valenzuela and Nolan Ryan square off in a pitching duel...Hearing the majestic voice of the late Bob Shepard announce the line-ups at Yankees Stadium...Vin Scully, period.
Just moments. Impressions.
So...
What experiences, what impressions, what defining moments, what learnings, do you need to journal for your sake and for the sake of your descendants?
All of this makes me grateful that the Apostle John, at nearly a century old, relented and wrote the gospel that bears his name. Ask me, if you're curious.
Whether you paint your memories after the style of Rembrandt or Monet, I encourage you to put the brush to canvas, the pen to paper, the memory to posterity.
Quotation from 700 Sundays, Kindle Edition, copyright 2005 by Billy Crystal.
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Michael Fox
m·agine!
530/613.2774
P.O. Box 9144
Auburn, CA, USA 95604
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In addition to personal and professional coaching,
m·agine! specializes in spiritual transformation coaching,
employing its proprietary models
--Values, Vision, Voice and Heart, Soul, Mind & Strength--
as well as
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® curriculum
published by CPP, the People Development People.
Michael's books include
Complete in Christ,
Complete in Christ Spiritual Transformation Workbook,
and Biblio·files.
Coaching fees are based upon a sliding scale. Contact us for details.
Limited scholarships are available for spiritual transformation coaching.
On the flip side, if you are able, please inquire about opportunities
to fund scholarships for those who cannot afford coaching fees.
View our archives!
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