Thunderous roars echoed from every corner of Oriole Park. The reverberating screams of “Let’s go O’s” flew from the bleachers above to our …..ears possibly a half mile away where we were standing outside the gates. We had not arrived for ten minutes total when we were greeted with possibly the heart of baseball: ads. Vendors littered the walk, selling spirit items: t-shirts of the players, baseball caps, and air filled noisemakers to get our spirits up. A natural skeptic, we were hesitant of these and held tightly on to our tickets as we were pulled along by the crowd towards Gate C. Immediately before the gate, however, the pace of the line slowed down noticeably, presumably because everyone had to enter in semi-single file. The first and only free item that night were rubber ducks given out by 106.5FM radio and Kikkoman local sponsors of the team. Once through the gates, the entire atmosphere changed.
The warp was established in two key ways: size and smell. The sheer enormity of Oriole Park was enough to take away the breaths of two ‘ball game virgins’, if you will. The throng was thick, with men and women of all ages moving as one body towards the central congregation. These authors followed the crowd to the food stands, where food was flying – yes, flying – everywhere. Ressi in fact had a dismembered lemon thrown between her and a friend on their way to their seats. The process was a perfect example of the quote “quality is found in the bosom of quantity”. I suppose of the 50,000 people that might have crossed the grounds that day, each stand saw at least 1000 different customers, if not more. Yet the waiting line was less than one minute total, (better than most fast food, if you think about it) and the food was delectable. One would not find a single complaint for lack of an undercooked dog or fries dripping with grease. Food in hand, we marched to our seats on the third level, section 344.
The pulsing of the music reached our ears long before we knew where the sound originated, and the ground was alive beneath our feet as we stepped over and in between rows of people and chairs. By this time, a sense of something close to shock had set in, and little more than mumbled “Excuse me,” s passed from this author’s lips. The food was taken care of first, devoured in minutes, and then all eyes were on the game. Oddly, nothing much happened. For the first three innings, it was back and forth play. No one gave up outs, no one made runs. I was starting to lose interest in the game when… # 10 was up to bat, a mister Adam Jones of the Baltimore Orioles. The screens came alive, and the audience was on their feet in seconds, backing the outfielder as he took a few practice swings. Now came the by-now-expected lag: a ball. A strike. Another ball. Another ball. A strike. Something like five minutes passed with none of the ‘action’ I thought was characteristic of baseball. My eyes had begun to wander when “CR-ACK!!” the bat connected with the ball with a sweet, satisfying explosion. Fire lit the seats of everyone in the stadium – they must have been itching for something to happen – and they were on their feet in praise and anticipation. The ball was high and the ball was far. It was beautiful, the kind of sight that deserves your full body to appreciate it. My eyes followed the ball across the field and my knees began to bend, raising my body slowly off the seat. It was going down, down…
The ball was caught by the other team. A sense of abject disappointment welled up in my stomach, and I became very, oddly, angry at the other team. I groaned audibly with the rest of the crowd as Jones trudged back into the Orioles dugout. However, the deal was done. A feeling of anticipation like none I had experienced yet welled up inside me as another stepped up to bat. With every ounce of my strength, I found myself screaming with the crowd when anyone caught a fly. “Luuuke” became a rallying cry as number 30 hit the ball. “Let’s go O’s”
Why the change? was the next question. It was simple, really. The feeling of being a part of something, of being a member of a larger cause, a larger goal, overtook all self-consciousness and apprehensions. The energy was contagious; the crowd was electric. Every time the ‘organist’ started a chant of
- Balls thrown to the audience
- Trying to get the attention of the smile cam
- The hotdog ketchup/mustard/relish race, crab spin, and other minis.
- Charge!
- The wave
In the end the Orioles didn’t win, but even at that scene, with a slight feeling of disappointment, fireworks lit the sun setting sky. As the shells burst, as it welcomed the night and said farewell to the day, as we move on with the lost and get survivors to remember for some the first baseball game in their life.
