It all started around 5:30 on Friday afternoon. The work day was done and like a certain prehistoric icon of my youth, I was outta there.

Yabba Dabba Friggin Do!

First stop was to pick up a quick dinner so I could wolf it down on my way to the baseball field. Over the years, I’ve mastered the art of eating pizza via the “fold” while driving and most importantly without dripping on the pants. Do not try this at home, it takes years of practice and experience and I think you have to be from the Northeast in order to do it.

I arrive at the field with 5 minutes to spare. We are staring at three consecutive games Fri through Sunday if my son’s team could win that night. This has been the most enjoyable season to date so we are all in on a victory.

And they won.

Our weekend schedule was rather clear cut and a whole lot busier.

We’re cool with that.

We get home late on Friday night and after a second dinner for my always starving son, all is quiet by about 10:30 P.M. In a bold move, my wife and I decide to finish off the last two episodes of our latest must-watch-binge-TV show “Bloodline”. Two thumbs up from both of us on this messy family drama/mystery. Go watch it now and thank me later.

By 12:30 we are drained from the show (yes we are that dedicated) and from the prior week as well. Off to bed we go knowing my daughter has her last softball game at 9:00 A.M.

We make it to the field by 8:30 on Saturday morning, mega coffee mugs in hand. At times it was too hot, too cold, too foggy and too rainy, but we persevere and enjoy the hell out of it. This has been such a fun year with such a great group of kids and truly outstanding coaches. But more on that in a little bit.

With a few hours to spare before my son’s next game, we map out a plan to get some things done within the 4-5 hour window. Dry cleaning, food shopping and some other things are on the docket so we split up and dominate the task completions.

One task I may have failed to mention to my wife was the need to plant my three secretly purchased Veronica ‘First Love’ (I’m only slightly embarrassed to share that name with you).

With an hour to spare before heading out to the field, I sneak in a run. Truth is, I despise running. I’m a mouth breather so while running I look like I am going to keel over at any time. But damn, once that runner’s high kicks in it is heavenly. Eyes sting from sweat, calves are burning and the possibility of being attacked by a coyote all make it worth while. I’m ready to take on the remainder of the weekend.

Fast forward to 9:00 and my son’s team has been eliminated from the playoffs. The kids are distraught but we do get one more game the following day so they look forward to a less pressure filled consolation game.

That night my wife and I decide to watch a movie. A real uplifting tale known as “Still Alice”. Yes that was sarcastic, but it was a great movie with a better performance from Julianne Moore. She suffers from early onset Alzheimer’s disease so it is heartbreaking to watch her slowly deteriorate. My grandmother had Alzheimer’s and it was so difficult to watch my grandfather not understand her condition. It didn’t seem fair to live out their final years that way so my wife and I are very sensitive to it. And now of course we continue to test each other’s memory in a fit of panic. Great way to go to bed on a Saturday night.

Sunday morning is casual as we have nowhere to be until 3:00 in the afternoon. My wife makes pancakes, we drink tons of coffee, the kids obsess over the Game Show Network and we all chill.

Around 12:00 or so, I decide to head to the basement for a quick exercise session. I know, you are impressed by my dedication. Well just know that the session never came to be … and here is why.

As I completed the descent into the basement and glanced ahead to the weight bench I noticed something didn’t seem right. Is it normal to step into 2 inches of water down here? I didn’t think so.

After gathering myself and fighting off the panic attack, the “water leak detective” kicked in. Is it our hot water heater? Did the dish washer leak underneath? Nope and nope. Upon further inspection, it was clear that the sump pump wasn’t operating. Oh good, that will play out nicely. I immediately ran upstairs, informed the family that I’ll be out of commission for hours and began sopping it all up with the wet vac.

Two hours later I had taken care of the bulk of it and had a decision to make. Skip the last game and jump on replacing the sump pump or take care of it later that night. My instinct was to skip the game, but I relented and we were all in attendance together.

I don’t even remember the final score but do remember how sad we were to see it end. Another year in the books. My son will be 13 in July so who knows how many more baseball seasons we have left. What I do know is just how fantastic this season was.

There are a lot of knocks against organized sports and crazy coaches and spoiled kids. In many cases, I’ve seen that to be true. But not this year, not by a long shot. Between my daughter’s team and my son’s team, I’ve seen what it means to have great coaches, great parents and great kids. The kids were not only coached well, but coached fairly and treated with unbelievable respect. That results in an experience they will never forget and cherish for the rest of their lives.

And back to the sump pump.

Luckily we had no additional rain so the basement wasn’t a complete washout by the time we returned home. We picked up a new sump pump and thank the good lord above, my brother-in-law/neighbor put it in for me and taught me a hell of a lot along the way. I think I now owe him a new 30′ x 30′ garden bed or some new grasses … if he allows me to put it in.

While the pump is fixed, we still have a problem with the pipe that drains the water away from the house. The best guess is that an animal is stuck in the pipe (probably one of those frickin rabbits) and for the life of me, we cannot locate where it all drains. Because of that, I am waiting for Roto Rooter to show up any minute now. Writing is how I handle stress these days so that is why you have had to put up with this long winded post.

But there is more.

I have been digging through our old house records to see if we had anything that indicated where the sump pump pipe could be located. In doing so, I came across this.

The letter that the young couple who purchased our old home had sent to us back in 2004. My wife cried like a baby when she read it the first time and in fact, cried again today when I sent it to her via text.

I also found this stuck in between a few old papers.

My son, not even two years old, harassing me while I was trying to work. I kid you not, within seconds of taking this picture, he broke the letter “g” on my keyboard and for years after that, I had to make a specific pressing motion to get the “g” to appear. I would like to go back in time and laugh more at that mishap. And rub his curls a few times.

One last memory for you me. This was the brochure when our old house was up for sale.

This is where all of the early garden experimentation started. I laugh now reading the description of the home as having “beautiful perennial gardens”. They were OK at best, but damn if I don’t remember the time spent in that backyard tinkering with the Coreopsis and Sedum, knowing my two favorite people in the universe were waiting for me inside.

A special time and place and for today, a nice escape from the smell of stagnant water and pipe glue.

Thanks for doing me a solid if you made it this far.

John