Seamless

I cut myself last night. Nothing too unusual about that, except I somehow managed to cut myself with a baseball.

With the middle kid playing on two soccer teams and the oldest with activities of his own, I've skipped coaching this year. The youngest is playing traveling baseball and I didn't see how I could coach him and spend any time with his brothers. I'm not sure his brothers would consider that a loss, but I try to avoid the perception, if not the reality, of playing favorites.

Baseball all star season's starting now, however, and with the youngest playing for my old co-coach P. again, I thought I'd help out at last night's practice. By helping out, I mean standing in the outfield while the kids scrimmaged.

Apparently I looked bored between innings because Coach P. threw me a high fly ball. I misjudged and at the last minute had to make a stab at it. Two handed, just like you're supposed to, except the ball hit bare hand, not glove.

"Damn it," I said, probably louder than I should have, picking up the ball and throwing it in. Then I looked down at my hand. It was bleeding. A lot.

"Ow," I whimpered. "Look at this," I said to one of the other dads.

"Jesus," he said. "That's messed up."

It was. A big chunk of meat gone between the pinkie and the ring finger, gouged out by the seam of the ball. The other dad helped me wrap it up and it stopped bleeding. It still hurt, but not so much I couldn't sit on the bleachers and watch the rest of practice.

Until the Lovely Bride arrived at the park to drop off our oldest for his cross-country practice. "Let me see that," she ordered.

I unwrapped the bandage.

"For God's sake, you need stitches. You need to go to urgent care."

"But I'm the team parent and we're having the first team meeting after practice," I whined.

"Then the clinic will be closed and you can spend the night sitting in the emergency room," she said.

"You're doing errands tonight. How's our kid going to get home? Hitchhike? Maybe he can get a ride from some nice man with a panel van and a Kit Kat in his pocket."

"Why would you say something like that?" she asked.

"Because it's funny?" I suggested.

"It's horrible," she said.

"He doesn't think so," I replied, pointing to our smirking child.

"You'll be doing everyone a favor if you leave now," she told me.

So off to urgent care I went where the nurse practitioner cleaned the wound, stitched me up, and sent me on my way. When I got home the two youngest gagged with delighted horror at my hand.

After that was out of the way, I asked the youngest how the team meeting went.

"Fine," he said.

"Did you meet everyone?" I asked.

"Yeah. Coach P. had all the kids introduce themselves and their parents."

"That's nice."

"You and mom weren't there so I said I was a foster child."

"You told them what?" his mother asked with alarm.

"That I was a foster child."

"What did they say?" I asked.

"They laughed."

"I'm proud of you, buddy," I told him.

"You deserve each other," said the Lovely Bride.