Por Fin, Ganamos! (Finally, We Won!)

Well, at least the grandparents will cheer when they hear that on Saturday, our second to last game of the season, we won, 10 to 6. Gabe played the entire game, no bench warming involved and hit a triple a single and made an out while playing 2nd base. It’s enough to make a parent want to post a new blog entry…

The Team Clown

So, the Dragones, though improving at every practice, have not won a game yet. It can be demoralizing, but what can you do? It helps that we have Alejandro, the team clown.

Alejandro comes to practice every week on his inline skates. This is a respectable feat in and of itself, given the street and sidewalk hazards in Oaxaca (see September 9 post). Alejandro plays an important role for the Dragones…he is the by far the worst player and he knows it. For this reason, he never comes to games…or he comes and watches to support the team, but he must love baseball because he faithfully shows up to practices. He bats, throws and catches with the rest of the team. Last week, I realized how important he is to the Dragones. It’s not just that he jokes, teases and makes fun of himself continuously, causing everyone to laugh and lighten up. It’s also important for some of our new players who aren’t so good, to feel that they are not alone. They are not the worst player on the team because…hey…look, it’s Alejandro. He can barely play baseball, but wow, does he have a good time.

Every team needs an Alejandro and the coaches know it. They love him and they play easy on him when it’s his turn to bat or throw or field the ball. Take infield practice. Blancas gets the boys to line up at third, where there is the understanding that they will take turns fielding ground balls and throwing to first base…standard infield practice. When it is Gabe’s turn, Blancas hits a fast ground ball to him. If you’ve never played baseball before, this is a terrifying moment in a ball player’s life…not knowing if that ball is going to take a bad bounce and hit you in the groin, or the neck or the face. The command from the coach is “en frente”…or get in front of the ball. This is a basic baseball skill and the good players will almost always stop the ball from getting past them. The better a player gets, the less fear he feels. Gabe, for example, has become a confident infielder. After months of these drills, when the ball is hit, he gets himself in front of the ball, fields it and makes a straight hard throw to first base.

Alejandro steps up for his turn and it’s another matter. First, he will miss the hard grounder as it rolls under his legs, his mitt not quite low enough to stop the ball. You’ve see this sight on any number of baseball flicks…Bad News Bears, for one. The second grounder, Alejandro watches as it goes by to his left… the fear of that hard grounder keeping him from getting in front of the ball.

“Ay Ay Ay…” coach Blancas says and slaps his head, at which point Alejandro throws up his arms and cracks a joke. Blancas laughs and hits him a soft grounder. This one, Alejandro stops with his mitt, grabbing the ball with his throwing arm and releasing his high-arced rainbow to first base. All the other players pat him on the back and he goes to the end of the line to wait for his next turn.

I suppose it’s unfair to focus on Alejandro in this way, but Blancas told us a story last week that made me think it might be appropriate. Blancas coached Vinny Castilla Soria and his big brother when they were young. Big brother was always the promising player, strong, physically agile and quick. Vinny was scrawy and weak, but he loved to play ball. Vinny’s brother lost interest in baseball eventually and became a business man. Vinny stayed with baseball and went on to become one of the best Mexican players to get to the Majors. May it be so for Alejandro.

Dia de Los Muertos

Those of us living in California have become more and more familiar with Latin American and Mexican holidays, so Dia de Los Muertos, celebrated on November 1 and 2, might ring a bell. Day of the Dead is one of the most important holidays in Mexico. A Oaxacan mom friend, who works for the airline Mexicana, said all flights were over-booked on the Dia de Los Muertos weekend and into the week. Mexicans travel from all over to be with their loved ones as they honor their dead. She went as far to say that the celebration is even more important than Christmas for families. Jason and I contemplated how Thanksgiving for us in the US is a holiday that draws family members together. Muertos reminded us of our special November holiday, with two days off school and all the traditional foods taking their place on the table (During Dia de Los Muertos, special bread is eaten, chicken mole is served and lots of hot chocolate is drunk by the time November 3rd rolls around). One large difference between the holidays is that the focus of Muertos is less on food, more on remembrance.

On November 1st, Jason and I traveled to the cemetery to see the action and that night we brought the children back to see how the celebration was unfolding. Scores of families were cleaning and decorating grave sites. Hundreds of merchants had set up shop, selling flowers, food and drink, a few kiddie rides had been brought in to keep the little ones in celebration mode. This scene did not feel like a place of mourning. Though the Mexicans do grieve for their dead, they also live among them differently than what I am used to. They seem to exist in a state between natural and supernatural…there is not as strong a division between those two realities, so having a party at the gravesite of Tia Juanita, is like enjoying her company. Though she is dead, her presence is still among them.

Jorge Martinez Blancas...or Humbled in Oaxaca

Our new little league “trainer" has transformed our practices and his mantra is “Vamanos Alegres”…Let’s be happy. That’s what he wants. He wants to boys and girl to be happy when playing, to have fun, I suppose this would be an accurate translation. He’s also teaching them ball skills along the way…I’ve missed the last 4 practices, first we missed two because of being in PEscondido, then I missed because of my ear infection.

Being back on the field today, I saw the transformation. He has the kids “playing baseball” and not “thinking baseball”…if that makes sense. I’ll try to explain the distinction…it’s still a bit fuzzy to me. I suppose I noticed it because everyone was hitting, and I mean everyone, down to the last wimpy player. Gabe is hitting better than ever, but so are all the other players. Blancas moves batting practice very quickly…today starting everyone on bunts and his command was to make contact no matter what. Even if the pitch was high or in the dirt, he wanted them going for contact. They got as many pitches as they needed to get the bunt. Most made contact on that first pitch…especially by the third round. One batter was on deck, one bunting and the rest were in outfield, rotating from first to third. Playing the bunt wasn’t the issue and things moved fast. Next, he let them do one good hit, again going round the rotation, then two hits…(he was pitching).

After that, we played a scrimmage and he got a few of us parents involved. I was one of the fools, of course, because I always bring my mitt and wear the appropriate clothes in case they need my help. We were all players and all got to bat. My first at bat was a strong showing. Blancas seemed surprised. In the next inning, I played right field and had to sprint to catch a fly ball that Gabe hit and couldn’t get to it. I admit, I was feeling a bit of vertigo from my ear infection, but that’s not an excuse. I simply couldn’t get to that ball. It's harder than it looks!

Following that fiasco, we made our third out and I was first up. I felt winded from my run, but ready to whack the ball again in true Susi style, but Blancas was on to me and pitched outside. I did not catch on. He was toying with me and laughing the entire time. I did swing hard at that second pitch and lost my balance, twirled and landed on my butt in the dirt. The parents in the bleachers were roaring and so was Blancas. He had this gleam in his eye and got me swinging and missing on the next pitch as well. The subsequent batter was another parent and Blancas struck him out too, grinning like an evil trickster (okay, that may be too strong…not evil, but yes, he was throwing some funky stuff to us). Meanwhile, I am a bit embarrassed and covered in dirt, trying to avoid the glinting eyes of the parents who will, I’m sure, tell this tale to their great grandchildren, about the gringa who thought she was hot stuff, but fell in the dirt like a circus clown, all for their amusement.

I was redeemed at my next at bat. I took the advice I’m always giving to Gabe...to be patient…I was patient and got my hit. Blancas also may have felt a bit of remorse for getting me to go after that terrible curve ball.

Gabe was three for three in the scrimmage, hit a homerun over the left-fielder’s head and had a great practice. I was sore like heck and ready for bed!

Sure enough, the following day, Blancas laughed at me about the "curve ball" he had thrown, checking to see if I showed any signs of being angry. I wasn't angy, I told him, just humbled. He invited us to his house for pollo and mole. I think in his own way he was trying to make amends for causing a 40-year-old woman to fall in the dirt in front of spectators.

More Little League

The photo…I love this man. There are two Zapotec campesinos (farmers) at the baseball field where we sometimes play. Here he is making the lines for a Dragones game. He uses a coffee can, with a screen on the bottom. It is fastened to a stick and contains the “cal” or “lime”. He puts a string connected to a nail at home plate and stretches it all the way past first into right field to get a straight shot at the baseline. He does similarly for the third base line. Then he walks with his can on a stick and shakes out the lime all the way into the outfield. You see him here making the batter's box. When there is no game to be played, he and his buddy trim the grass, weed, sweep and pick up trash.

Some aspects of Mexican life are so precious to me, I have a difficulty expressing my feelings about them. The campesino, silently doing his job while the boys played catch (not pictured), and he walks around them, never saying a word…not even a “con permiso” (excuse me), that is precious. He symbolizes so much that is beautiful about Mexico, the ingenuity, the simplicity, the quiet and joyful work that the workers perform to keep this country (and ours, across the border) going. I hardly know how to write about it.

What I do know how to write about…little league drama. It’s been a while since I’ve posted about little league, but the drama continues. About 3 weeks ago, the multiple losses our team had experienced caused parental uproar. Mumblings from those in the bleachers, meetings in the dugout during practice…all this was happening under my nose and I was happily ignoring the tension, reading my novel, or putting on my mitt and practicing with the team. Our parents were fed up with the Dragones’ trainer, a 20-something-ball player named Marco.

Every little league team in Oaxaca has a trainer and a coach. Our coach is Gabriel. He has a son named (of course) Gabriel who plays on our team. As an aside, every father we have met here, who has a son, (the first born son) bears his father’s name. This makes life easier for us because we have to remember fewer names. No one seemed to be complaining about Gabriel. Maybe he isn't paid, though I'm not sure about that. For some reason, the blame fell on Marco.

Marco was our trainer and as I learned later, he was a paid employee of the parents. We pay a fee every two weeks for Gabe to play on the Dragones. (In US, though coaches are all volunteer, we do pay a fee, a one-time registration fee.) In Oaxaca, our little league money pays umpires, field usage and trainer. Our trainer Marco, whom we Jensens liked quite a bit, was not appreciated by the other parents. They felt he was not motivating the boys well enough, so they fired him.

We hired a new trainer, Jorge Martinez Blancas.

Blancas is an interesting old cat. He is about 65…came to Oaxaca in his 20s as a “draftee” of sorts. He was brought from his state of Jalisco to Oaxaca to play for the ball team. He never left. He did play baseball for a few years. Back then, the teams were like minor league or farm teams. Now they’re a bit closer to professional, though the money pros are paid in Mexico is still well below the US standard…

So…Jorge (everyone calls him Blancas) is one of these guys who always has his coaching voice switched on. So far we’ve seen him in three settings. Coaching, of course, then we get to ride with him in his car to games. He has generously offered this to us, since he lives across the street. When he drives us to a game, he talks/yells in that same pitch and voice in casual conversation as he uses when he’s encouraging the boys and girl on the field…(Did know we have a girl on our team? Her name is Adela. She’s a great player, our first baseperson.)

The third setting we’ve seen him in is in his house. We arrived at his doorstep (on time) to get a ride to the game one Saturday and he was still eating his breakfast. His wife was there, serving him, literally, serving him. He was ordering her around in the same coaching voice…generational and machismo all in the same moment. It made me a little crazy, but the wife seemed to take it all in stride. They have something like six kids and twenty grandkids together. So, Blancas is a character and he is our new trainer.

Marco is long gone. I’m still growing used to the idea that parents care fire a coach. In the end, I feel badly that they fired Marco, but it could be good for us to have Blancas kicking our collective butt.

More on Blancas in a later post…

Art Auction

I’ve never been to an art auction before last night. What an incredible experience. Maybe it’s because I’m a writer and think of myself as an artist…or maybe it’s because I’m a competitor and the scene was about competition. Gabe and Abby got into the bidding (the silent auction part)…patrolling the art pieces on which we had bid and telling us whenever someone had bid above us. In the last two minutes of the silent auction, potential buyers hovered like vultures around their chosen pieces, watching to see who would outbid them and ready to engage with their parties to see if offering a higher price was a wise decision. We won our painting of choice… a piece called Peces (fish), oil on canvas, by Esteban Urbieta, a young up-and-coming artist. The painting is wonderful. I hope you can see it sometime when you visit us in Berkeley.

We were invited to this auction because of our connection with Abby’s art teacher. She and her boyfriend, a contemporary artist here in Oaxaca, had two pieces for sale at this particular event.

The auction, put on by the expatriate community in Oaxaca (retired wealthy Americans and Canadians), turned out to be a fantastic night of art indulgence for the four of us. Oaxacan artists are gifted and wonderfully fresh. Moreover, their pieces are sold for little money in comparison to their American and European compatriots. We paid about $200 for Peces. We love it. We love it today. Will we love it tomorrow and for many months and years to come. Abby’s art teacher was thrilled we had gotten such a deal. It’s enough to make one addicted to art.

I wish I had Sharon with me or Rick Shaw…friends who are regularly looking at art and what is new and cutting edge. But alas…we were left with our own thoughts and feeling about the art pieces, which in the end is probably a good thing.

Surfing As Religion

Out of our experience in Puerto Escondido, I have been contemplating surfer culture. The town of PE is full of young people and not-so-young-people, all of whom have put their lives on hold to find the perfect wave. They come from all over the world.

We ate breakfast with an Irish bloke, Patrick (no joke…his name was Patrick) about 31-years-old, who had been surfing for over ten years. When he heard we were from California, he asked me if I knew about San Clemente Beach. I do. When I was a girl, my family spent a week camping at San Clemente every summer for years. He told us that he learned to surf at that beach and that the 5 weeks he spent there were the happiest of his life.

Since then, he has found odd jobs to sustain himself and dipped into his savings a little. He surfed for a year in Brazil, learned Portuguese, hung out with Argentine surfers who, when they got drunk, waxed on and on about Puerto Escondido and Zicatella Beach. Finally, he moved himself to surfer heaven and has been in PE for the past three years. Patrick is no bum...He has a college degree and a savings account and teaches English at the local college in Puerto Escondido. He has a family in Ireland that loves him and a new baby nephew of whom he is the proud godfather. Yet, here he is in Puerto Escondido, surfing.

I think I understand surfing as “religion” for the first time. There is a zen to the sport, being at one with nature, connecting with powerful forces, not conquering, but getting high from the experience, from the ride. Plenty of surfers also get hurt and die in the waters of Puerto Escondido. Patrick had experienced a bad wipe out three months earlier and was just coming around to feel comfortable again on the board.

It’s easy to be jealous or maybe critical of surfers, but I’ve given myself over to the metaphor. I do admire the devotion, the commitment, the costs that are joyfully incurred, the risks that are taken every day…all for the spiritual experience that is surfing. When I look at Patrick in that way, I am humbled in comparison, by my modest spiritual passion.