The trip for me was everything that I had hoped for. It brought out the best in things that I experience in the world.
This trip made baseball fun again, made me realize why I love the game, and why I play.
During the season baseball can become sort a of chore: practice every day working on small details, no audience, hard work, and only focusing on winning. You don’t talk to the other team, you put your head down and you do your work. And if you make some mistakes, you could see the end of your playing time.
In this trip, we got to hang out with the hundreds of kids in the stands, meet and hear stories from kids on the other team, and overall just be out there for fun.
The goal was not to just win. If the ump made a bad call, we didn’t get in his face about it. If someone struck out, it was all about looking for the next opportunity. The games were just pure fun. Through this experience, I remembered the good times that come with this amazing game that I used to take for granted.
I also realized just how fortunate I am to have the most simple equipment that I often forget about. Small donations, like old baseballs or batting gloves meant so much to the kids receiving them. I thought back to the times when I lost some baseball equipment, whether it was just losing a baseball in the bushes or forgetting a glove on the field, and how easy it was for me to replace. In towns like Boca Chica or Santo Domingo, that simply isn’t reality. It just makes me appreciate everything I have, and inspires me to look for more opportunities to help out like that.
Now when I step onto a baseball field in the U.S, I will remember why I love to play. Thanks again for an amazing trip