My First Ball Glove

It was one of the few father-son moments that I cherish. I was buying my first softball glove. It almost didn’t happen.

It all started with a piece of paper tacked to a tree in our schoolyard. There would be tryouts for a team in the Willowdale Softball League. Unlike today, where everybody pays and everybody plays, you had to make this team for the right to go on the field.

Softball was played at our school, so it was no surprise that there was quite a crowd trying out for the 15 positions that were available.

I was there, too, but I had a problem. I didn’t have a proper glove. I had never played on a team, so I was forced to use one of my brother’s gloves for the tryout. This created another problem. All of my brothers who had gloves were left-handed. I was right-handed. So there I was at the practice with a glove on the wrong hand trying to shag fly balls.

The deal with my family was if I made the team, I would get my own glove.

I was in serious trouble. Some of the kids had gloves big enough to catch watermelons. The ball would soar up in the air and these big nets would extend towards the sky, the ball magnetically drawn towards the big pocket.

My brother’s glove perched on the wrong hand would timidly crawl towards the projectile like a caterpillar climbing a tree. More often than not, it would hit the leather as if it was wood and plop out. The coach would shout at the other kids to catch with two hands. I had no option. Both hands were necessary to control this savage beast.

One by one, the kids signed the registration form, indicating their acceptance to the Promised Land at Kinsmen Park. My name was not called. Finally, on the last practice before the first game of the season, Lloyd Birney, the coach, called me over. He told me that he was impressed with the fact that I tried so hard and that he didn’t have the heart to cut me. While this stung my pride a bit – he didn’t have the heart to cut me? – I was past the Pearly Gates. I was in heaven. I would finally get my own glove.

My dad and I got in the car the next evening and went the shrine of sporting goods, Dobby’s on Yonge Street. As soon as we entered into the store the smell of the leather caressed our noses. My dad and I bonded as we weighed every aspect of what I needed and what I could spend. Soon I had the glove of my dreams. It didn’t have any major league player’s signature on it, but that was no problem. It was mine and I put my name carefully on the strap on the back.

As I grew, so did my hands. It soon came time to buy a bigger mitt. However, like a first love, I haven’t forgotten my first glove. I still have it. Once in awhile I get it out, cover as much of my hand as I can with it, thunk a ball into the pocket and talk to it about the old times and the dreams we once had. Also, I thank it for an amazing over-the-shoulder catch in the final game of the Ontario championship in 1965. Along with my prized stuffed dog Bullit, I expect that glove will accompany me throughout eternity.

You see, this glove was not an ordinary glove. It represented that moment when the child started becoming a boy. And having my father along to witness that moment meant the world to me. It was one of the few times my dad and I hung out as men.