Point of View: Synchrony
All of a sudden, in synchrony with the weather, the sports scene here has brightened, just when I thought it would be yet another silent spring.
Joe Gonzalez, whom I often see on his midday constitutionals, told me this afternoon that the girls lacrosse team had won two in a row, and I told him that our softball team had the day before finally won one, shellacking Amityville 15-0. Even the coach, Kathy Amicucci, was seen pirouetting.
There’s nothing like a win to put a spring in your step, not that it’s the only thing — a good game is ideally what you want — but sometimes a win is just what you need. It lightens the spirit, just as temperatures in the 60s do.
Baseball too has been competitive, as has been the case with boys and girls track — not to mention the as-of-this-writing-undefeated boys tennis team and — not least — the warmer weather, so I can’t complain.
I should add to that reason-to-be-cheery list a puppy. Mary has been wanting one for a while now, even to the extent of having put some money down with a breeder of cream-colored golden retrievers in the Blue Ridge mountains of western Virginia. She’s used, though, to males, and there were none in February’s litter. It’s almost as if you’re expecting. People I know who know Mary’s been looking say, “Well . . . well. . . ?”
“Not yet,” I say. “But soon, maybe this summer.”
Anyway, I agree that a puppy will lighten our spirits and perhaps extend our lives, as will also, I think, a Ping-Pong table. She beats me in swimming and backgammon, I beat her in tennis, and, judging from a recent stay in Mexico, we’re equal in Ping-Pong.
The all-weather table is to go in the basement, which recently we had waterproofed and brightly painted.
It’s pretty fair to say that this could well be our last dog and Ping-Pong table, and that, therefore, we want to be as frisky as can be. To that end we go regularly to East End Physical Therapy on off-hours and pull weights down, and in, and out as, on TV, Ina Garten mixes dishes that almost bring on cardiac arrest just by looking at them. She seems happy, though.
Well, who wouldn’t be? It’s spring.