Happy Fourth

Clare made her first baseball All-Star team as a nine-year old, this on the Fourth of July. 2001; she was the only player who needed a little privacy to put on her All-Star tee shirt.  I have a picture of her swinging at the pitch before the one she got a hit on.  I wonder what the coaches thought as she ran down the line.  I know they didn’t want her to play the field.

She made the All-Star team the next year, too, right after which we went to Cooperstown.  Two years later, she hit her first homerun over a fence.  The next day, the Fourth, was the homerun hitting contest, featuring 24 boys, many if not most already on travel teams, and one girl who kept one-hopping the fence at the Bronco field.  Clare finished fifth that day.

Somewhere I have a picture of her standing on the front porch in her All-Star tee and uniform pants.  It’s an image I’ll carry with me the rest of my life.