Kennedy Cocktail: A Clumsy Family Narrative: DON’T STRIKE OUT!!

My dad’s dad, who we his grandkids affectionately called “Grandpa,” lived with our family from before I was born until he passed away during my 8^th grade year. In the 13 years that Grandpa and I spent getting to know each other, I found out the man harbored more than just a few pet peeves. Some of his favorites were:

Jackasses who can’t find their ass with their own two hands
“Those goddamn SOB’s” (this was applied generously to a lot of people)
Forgetting to take trash out on trash day
Ronald Reagan
Kids who scream bloody murder when no one is actually being murdered
Striking out (specifically in baseball, but presumably in life too)

Grandpa introduced my brother, Andrew, and me to baseball when we were young, and was then punished by having to serve as our baseball chauffeur for the entirety of our little league careers. Looking back, I can only guess that as a WWII survivor grandpa was able to endure things normal citizens shouldn’t have to suffer. He sat dutifully through every single game Andrew and I played, even though we played on separate teams.

Grandpa always sat on the bleachers right behind home plate. When one of us was up to bat, he would sometimes clamber up to the chain link fence to offer some helpful advice:

“You got two strikes on you! DON’T STRIKE OUT!!”

In Grandpa’s estimation, a strike out was a forgivable offense if you at least stuck your bat out and attempted to make contact with the ball. But there was NOTHING worse than striking out looking. It was inexcusable to let the final pitch pass you by without at least taking a hack at it.

Despite his best intentions to spur me onto greatness, my nerves as a 9 year old often crumbled on that final pitch, and I found myself trudging back towards the dugout, head down, baseball bat dragging behind me, hoping grandpa would just do us both a favor and leave me at the ball field until I could redeem myself the following weekend.

Thankfully Grandpa was a better grandparent than I was a baseball player, and win or lose he never failed to treat Andrew and I to Slurpees from 7-11. Where he also never failed to pick up a 16oz can of Miller High Life for himself. Reflecting on those 7-11 stops, I think they were his way of congratulating us in victory and commiserating with us in defeat, where those Slurpees were the closest substitute he could offer us to his own brown-bagged beverage. It was a moment of grandfatherly tenderness in which he knew that we needed a drink. And so did he.

I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to say enough about how much Grandpa loved his grandkids (even if some of us couldn’t find our asses with our two hands). But when I look back on my childhood, those little league days with Andrew and Grandpa represent some of the happiest days of my youth. Even if I did have stomach ulcers for most of those days.