Day 12: Dreamy Matheny
After the first full week without Major League Baseball games, I sort of felt a sense of accomplishment. Partially, it felt like a negative thing (in terms of the whole “no baseball” situation), but there seemed to be a positive element as well, in an “I survived week one” kind of way.
A friend of mine came over on Friday evening, and ended up staying fairly late. As usual, baseball was among our topics of discussion throughout the course of conversation, being revisited again and again over the hours we spent together. As I headed to bed in the early morning hour of Saturday, I was not prepared for what awaited me during my slumber.
I am certain, and I mean certain that there are plenty of Cardinals fans who have had dreams that involved Mike Matheny. I would assume the large majority of those dreams (of which, I’d further assume a large majority were dreamt by heterosexual females) were similar to each other in nature. On Friday night/early Saturday morning, I had my first dream (that I can recall) that involved good ole number 22. I assure you, this dream was not like any that other fans have had, particularly those, the nature of which I alluded to a moment ago. For starters, and for some strange reason, the setting was at the old (second) Busch Stadium.
Matheny & I met up after the game, down in the service tunnel, sort of by the old gate 8, out in the bleachers/outfield/northeastern portion of the ballpark. I guess he’d already given his postgame interview, because we walked and talked about the game (both the one he’d just finished managing, as well as “the game” in the more broad sense) for what was about 15 or 20 minutes in the dream. I remember precious little about the content of the conversation itself, except that it ended as he was walking beyond an area that had been sectioned off, and I wasn’t credentialed to pass beyond that point. He stopped before he was out of sight, thanked me, said it was nice chatting with me, and that he’d see me again tomorrow.
If only.
Some would posit that Matheny is your spirit guide, leading you to deeper understandings of the game of baseball.
I’m thinking that the pizza after midnight was a bad idea.