The crack of the bat. The smell of leather and popcorn. The chanting, the songs, the umpires....God, I hate baseball.
For years, I was forced to participate in my school's team and I count it as one of the greatest traumas of my life. With no co-ordination, hand-eye skills or desire, I can safely say I was the worst player that ever stepped foot onto that field. Each year, I would beg to be cut from the line-up, but being in such a small school, they needed all of the players they could get. So I stood in right-field and seethed. A life-long loathing of America's past-time was born on that grassy expanse in Lisbon, Iowa.
