It’s one of those summers — those wet ones, when every game gets rained out.
I’d plop on the edge of my bed, windows wide open, staring through the screen and cursing it — well, not real curses, but telepathically pleading with the clouds: Please let up. Please stop.
I wanted to be anywhere but here. I wanted to be on the softball field — with my teammates. Ugh, I wanted to win. I was ready in my crisp pleated white shorts and that beautiful brick-red shirt with my stark white team’s logo italicized across my chest. I sat ready: glove in one hand, ball in the other, pounding it back and forth, watching the rain pour down like a freaking hurricane.
No, of course it’s not a hurricane! But why all this rain — all summer? I’d wait for the call on the rotary phone — the one saying, “It’s only delayed, not cancelled.” I was only an hour away, and I would have run the entire way — fast — zoom, zoom, please... My Lord, stop this rain.
Well, that summer, as you can imagine, we didn’t play many games — hardly enough to decide a true champion. Back in those rotary phone days, only three trophies were given out across the entire division: MVP (Most Valuable Player), MIP (Most Improved), and Best Sportsman.
I always seemed to win Best Sportsman. But if they’d seen me in my room, telepathically cursing the clouds and slamming the ball back and forth into my glove, well, maybe not so much.
But maybe that’s why. I loved the game so much, I played my heart out — so much that the score never really mattered.
“Play like the score doesn’t matter.”
✨ Do you have a Rainy Day Summertime story to tell? Drop it in the comments below — and while you’re at it, pick up a cap and a crop tee! Will you be Team Summertime Bubbles or Team Puffins… or play for both sides? 😉 Come on over to the shop and check them out! 💗🐧🍭🧢