The Greatest to Have Ever Done It

I sat in the break room of the tiny 22-bed emergency department in Berkeley, California; 2,906 miles down the road (at the other end of the freeway) from where my heart and soul were. Leftover lemon chicken and pineapple fried rice sat cooling in front of me as I stared at my phone with tears streaming down my face. It was over. Derek Jeter's final game in Yankee Stadium. Derek Jeter had played his last game as shortstop for the New York Yankees. And there were pictures and video clips of him taking the field for the final time, crouching in the position that's been his for the past twenty years. Of the double from his first at bat, the go-ahead run he was responsible for in the 8th, the walk-off single to end the game, and of Andy Pettitte, Jorge Posada, and Joe Torre being in the dugout to close it out. And I just cried. It could not have been more perfect. It was like it was scripted. God is most assuredly a Yankee fan.

I have been in love with Derek Jeter since the summer I turned fourteen years old. There are SO many memories. The flip, the dive, the Mr. November homerun, the championships, the speaches, the milestones. But it's more than that. It's more than the combined sum of the pieces of history I've witnessed in person and via the media. Sure it's pretty great that the first pitch of a Major League Baseball game I ever saw live was hit by Derek Jeter over the left field fence at McAfee Coliseum in Oakland, CA. It's great that the last game that I saw at the old Yankee Stadium was the last Yankee-RedSox game to be played there. It's great that I saw a game at the new stadium this year and pondered that he still looks the exact same as the first game I saw on TV as a 14 year-old girl. Seriously, look it up. The jump-throw, the stance, every single nuance. Even today. Did you see the photo of him jumping in the air after the walk-off single? Tell me that he looks different than the photo of him jumping in celebration at the end of the 1996 world series. He doesn't. The photos are interchangeable. But I've learned more from Derek Jeter than the way baseball should be played. It's more than his talent and the intangibles and the off-the-field professionalism. It's how to live a life.

The first couple years of college I read the book he wrote in 2001, The Life You Imagine: Life Lessons For Achieving Your Dreams. And it changed my life. Seriously. It's on the short list of three books that have changed my life. And I've read a LOT of books. From this book I got the quote that is still at the bottom of my email signature to this day: "Dreams become realities when you love what you do." From this book I learned, as Derek Jeter's father told him, there will most always be someone better than you, but there is NEVER an excuse for someone to work harder than you. I learned that the way you do everything you do is important. He talks about how he didn't care if he was a garbage man, a plumber, or a tv repair man he would want to be the best there was at that position. He spoke of the things he learned from watching a cable repairman at his house as a young boy. He had no aspirations to be such, but he learned the value of hard work and the desire to be the best at whatever he was doing. He talks about how that man made him a better baseball player, just by being the best at what he was. You can learn something from every person you come across in life. Don't be too good to learn something from someone in a different station of life than you. I expect a lot. Of people, of things, of situations. It causes a lot of angst at times, because expectations can ruin an experience if you're not in control of the outcome. But I wouldn't have it any other way. I think this is part of why I'm such a big Yankee fan to be honest. They don't only demand perfection, they expect it. They expect to win the world series every year, and as Derek Jeter has said repeatedly in this book and elsewhere, if we didn't win the world series, the season was a failure. Why would you want to be ok with second place? Why would you want to be ok with pretty good? Perfection. Don't ever let yourself settle for decent. Don't ever aim for having a wining season, or making it to the playoffs or even making it to the world series. If you're going to aim for something, set a goal to win the world series. If that's not your goal every single year, get out of the game. Sure you can have a good season and not win the world series, but having a good season and having a failed season are not mutually exclusive. Derek Jeter expects to get a hit every single time he's at the plate. Every time. In a game where you can fail to get a hit 70% of the time and still be among the elite, many wonder why you'd expect to get a hit every time you're at the plate. Well, if you don't expect to get a hit every time you're at the plate, you might as well stay in the dugout and tell them to skip your turn. You know it's not going to happen every time, but that doesn't mean that you expect yourself to fail. Do you see the difference? He talks about how he wants the ball hit to him every single play. He wants to be the one at bat with the game on the line every single time. If you don't want the ball hit to you every play, why are you on the field? If you don't want the chance to be the hero at the plate with the game on the line, why are you playing the game? The big moments are why you play the game. Don't shy away from, don't take them as they come, seek them out, hope for them, expect them to be yours.

*editing note* Just watched the post-game interview ... did you see it?!  In the entire career of Derek Jeter I have not seen him cry once. And I haven't missed a moment of Derek Jeter's career. He teared up several times during the game, and welled up during the post-game interview. He was talking about feeling sentimental for the first time in his career when they took the field in the first inning. And then his voice cracked as he told how he heard the fans chanting "Thank you Derek" and he thought "What are you thanking me for? I was just doing my job. It's the fans that have made this amazing." I love this man. And yes, I'm crying again.

Don't bother setting a goal if it's not to be the best, go the farthest, do the most. And if you fail once, set the goal again next go-round. Don't accept less than perfection because of previous failures. Pick yourself up, work your hardest all over again, and aim for perfection every time. Don't ever set a goal to be okay at something. To be mediocre. Don't set a goal to just make it through your shift. Set a goal to change someone's life. He talked about the pressure of being Derek Jeter and that he played every moment of every game so that no one could say he didn't try hard enough. He spoke of how he wanted people who came to the stadium to see him play be able to say --even if he didn't get a single hit that day-- "but did you see the way he ran the grounder to the seond-baseman out?" He didn't want to not give 100% at any single second.  I read this book so many times that chunks of pages are falling out. The corners are all dog-eared, and the highlight marks and margin notes are fading. I read the book for motivation repeatedly to get me through a very trying nursing program when I felt like I was drowning every day and didn't know if I had what it took to make it through --to keep me motivated not to just get through but to be the best. And most days making it through felt iffy. That didn't mean the goal was not perfection though. It was never my goal to just make it through. Making it through was TOUGH but I wanted to make it through and be the best. As I was on stage at graduation receiving the award for expert clinician (the only one of my entire graduating class) I literally though of this book, and the ways that it helped me reach this point. I read the book several more times as I was becoming a new nurse and then a new nurse in the emergency department --fulfilling my dream. I was the best CNA and LPN and RN I could be every day, and no one worked harder than I did every day. And when I need a bit of motivation still to this day, I remember the lessons I read repeatedly in the beginning of my career -the lessons I learned while I was achieving my dreams. Derek Jeter made me a better nurse. Which sounds crazy unless you get it. Seriously. Read the book people. If I don't expect to get each IV on each attempt -every time- I have no business being in that room. (see end of last paragraph)

And so I cry. I cry because Derek Jeter happened. And it was amazing. The whole career. I cry because it's ending. And I cry because there will never be another baseball player to match what Derek Jeter is and has been for the last twenty years. 

Because Frank always says it best and there could not be a song more fitted to Derek Jeter...

And now, the end is here
And so I face the final curtain
My friend, I'll say it clear
I'll state my case, of which I'm certain
I've lived a life that's full
I traveled each and ev'ry highway
And more, much more than this, I did it my way

Regrets, I've had a few
But then again, too few to mention
I did what I had to do and saw it through without exemption
I planned each charted course, each careful step along the byway
And more, much more than this, I did it my way

Yes, there were times, I'm sure you knew
When I bit off more than I could chew
But through it all, when there was doubt
I ate it up and spit it out
I faced it all and I stood tall and did it my way

I've loved, I've laughed and cried
I've had my fill, my share of losing
And now, as tears subside, I find it all so amusing
To think I did all that
And may I say, not in a shy way,
"Oh, no, oh, no, not me, I did it my way"

For what is a man, what has he got?
If not himself, then he has naught
To say the things he truly feels and not the words of one who kneels
The record shows I took the blows and did it my way! (My Way lyrics -Frank Sinatra)

Farewell, Captain. You'll be missed.

Maybe Tomorrow We'll All Wear 42

What an amazing man Jackie Robinson was.  What an amazing strength of character. And how sad it was and how sad it is that what he did was such an accomplishment. Don't mistake me. I think Jackie Robinson was one of the greatest Americans to have ever lived, and one of the greatest players to ever play the game. What he did, what he accomplished, and the manner in which he did so was nothing short of admirable. The tragedy lies in that it was a feat to overcome. I'm not here to rewrite history. I'm well aware of the way the world is and the way the world was and has been. Why does hate exist? Well, every thing must have it's opposite. Love and hate. The question for me is, why do we as a human race let hate define us. Why do we direct hate towards each other? And not just hate but such deep-seeded loathing. Over such ...I don't even know the word ... irrelevant things.  It seems so easy now, so clear cut. Of course it's silly to have a separate entrance to a ballpark for each color of skin. But not then. And for so many in the world it does not seem silly to write off, to loathe, and to ruthlessly persecute masses of human beings on the basis of race. Religion. Gender. Sexual orientation.

As I sat in the movie 42 tonight in honor of Jackie Robinson Day, I felt as though I was being slapped. Each slur that was said, each mistreatment represented was a shock to me as a woman in today's society. I know this is the way it was and yet I can't help but think how ridiculous and utterly stupid people sounded when they said such hateful things about another human being simply because he was black. How silly they sounded and how ...again there is no adequate word ...pretentious they seemed for thinking they were superior to any other human being on this planet. I wondered if people today who protest such things in such grotesque displays of humanity's worst traits will realize how ridiculous they will sound in fifty or sixty years.

In a day filled with so much hate, on a day when parents are mourning the loss of a child, a brother, a friend, and even unknown persons after the terrorist attack in Boston, on such a day I ask myself why. April 15, 1947 Jackie Robinson became the first African-American major league baseball player to take the field on opening day with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Sixty-six years ago today. Eighty-two years after the end of the civil war. And seventeen long years before the Civil Rights Act. And still today this senseless hatred exists. It blows my mind. It's all so ...senseless.

Today may we look upon examples from the past. May we love a little more, hate a little less. I say Thanks to you Jackie Robinson. Thank you for having the courage to stand up and stand strong in the face of senseless wrong. Thank you for having the guts to put on your uniform with your number on your back and do what you loved every day. Thank you for having the courage to stare down an opposing pitcher and man filled with loathing toward you and ask "What are you afraid of?"  What are we afraid of? What are we afraid being accepting of others and loving our fellow human beings -label free -what are we afraid is going to happen if we do that?

Near the end of the movie Dodger's shortstop PeeWee Reese put his arm around Jackie Robinson in the center of the baseball diamond in Cincinnati. The crowd became enraged. Jackie asked "What are you doing?"  Reese replied, "I've got family here. I need them to know what I'm about. Who I am." Reese thanked Robinson for being the man that he was and then said, "Maybe tomorrow we can all wear 42 and they won't be able to tell us apart."  April 15, 2004 made Reese appear prophetic. It was a long over-due tomorrow, but beginning that day each year on April 15 every baseball player in the Major Leagues wears number 42 in honor of the man himself. The only number to be retired by all of baseball. Maybe tomorrow we'll all wear 42. Maybe tomorrow we'll realize that we're all the same. May tomorrow be today.

photo via

It's Official!!!!!!

Well, beat the drum and hold the phone --the sun came out today!
I'm born again, there's bluegrass on the field!
Roundin' third and headin for home, it's a brown eyed handsome man...
Anyone can understand the way I feel!


Oh, put me in coach! I'm ready to play, today!
Put me in coach, I'm ready to play --today!
Look at me, I can be centerfield!


Ah! That's right folks, baseball is BACK!!! Woohoo! And the sun did come out today, and I did feel born again and there was bluegrass on the field --Kentucky Bluegrass for those of you less familiar with the finer tunings and groomings of a professional baseball field. It's official, baseball is back, and I went to my first game tonight. And it was fabulous. This is the best time of year --seriously! There is just something about baseball. I went with my friend Siobhan to see the Mariners play the Angels. We sat on the 5th row of the 1st baseline --right by the dugout. I literally worried a couple times because my peanut shells were falling in the dugout --we were that close. Good thing the dugout was a pig-sty and you couldn't really differentiate my peanut shells from the used powerade cups and sunflower seed shells and other clutter ...seriously ...messy boys! Some of you may be wondering who allowed me to be that near the dugout. Well, I'm not going to tell you, because that wasn't the point of me telling you our seating location.

The point is, there was a group of 21-22 year old boys sitting in front of us who had happened upon front row tickets. A once in a lifetime opportunity. And they were having the time of their lives. And so were we. Not only because we got included in the dancing and screaming and high-fiving and celebrating of every good thing that happened, but because we were at a baseball game! That's what baseball is. It's the crack of the bat and snap of the ball hitting the glove. It's the smell of hot dogs and cracker jacks and fresh cut grass and finely manicured infield dirt. It's the unmatched one-on-one battle between the pitcher and each batter he faces. It's putting your hand over your heart and honoring your country at the start of every game. It's standing up in the middle of the game and putting your arms around total strangers and singing 'take me out to the ballgame' with all the fervor you did when you were five and your entire life was a game. It's a chilly spring night that feels like a hot summer afternoon with kool-aid and popsicles. There is nothing like it. And I can't wait till my next game!

I spent some time in the mudville nine, watchin' it from the bench.
You know I took some lumps when the mighty Casey struck out.
So say hey Willie, tell Ty Cobb and Joe Dimaggio;
Don't say it aint so, you know the time is now!

Got a beat-up glove, a homemade bat, and brand-new pair of shoes;
You know I think its time to give this game a ride.
Just hit the ball and touch em all - a moment in the sun!
Then *pop* its gone and you can tell that one goodbye!

Oh, put me in coach! I'm ready to play, today!
Put me in coach, I'm ready to play --today!
Look at me, I can be centerfield!

Me and Siobhan --yay for baseball!

Jaryd Weaver pitched for the Angels and had a no-no through 4+ innings!

Jeff Mathis :)

Ken Griffey Jr. --my new friend :) ps it was Jackie Robinson day so everyone had the number 42 on

Ichiro hit a grand slam!