I wear a lot of hats around
here. Mother’s day seems a popular
time to reflect on all those hats we wear, mom, wife, daughter, sister, aunt,
cousin, friend, neighbor, but also, taxi driver, doctor, carpenter, chef,
counselor, banker, janitor, philosopher, teacher, preacher, judge, jury and
soon to be back seat driver. I like wearing all that headgear and to be honest,
sometimes life might be a little more fun if there were an actual hat to wear
when I had to be the bad cop.
In reality, I don’t like to wear
many hats outside of keeping my ears warm. But I sure have had some great hats in my life,
literally. They may have been on
someone else’s head, but they remain inside mine. These are the hats that became so familiar that I still get
a catch in my throat, a warm spot in my heart, or just a happy feeling when I
spot one like them in a crowd because, in my mind, the head under those hats is
crystal clear and that hat is like a time machine that takes me back.
I can see Grandpa mowing the lawn, back and forth,
past my cousins and me on an ordinary summer day. But the hat on his head sits at a jaunty angle and is cocked
just a little to one side, his signature look. When he really wanted to show off he’d push it way up
his forehead so it barely hung on, so we could have a better view of whatever
little show he was putting on. He
never went anywhere without a hat that I can remember. It was just a part of his act. It was a part of him. When I see that jaunty cap in a crowd…I
see him.
Then along came my first son and
low and behold the year he turned two, he discovered ball caps. That kid wore a hat from sun up to sun
down; from the moment he woke up, inside or out, for meals, naps and car rides,
even to see Santa, for an entire year.
He had a couple of favorites that got a pretty good test in the summer
months when they would be wet from his sweaty head. But he refused to take them off no matter how we reasoned
with him. I can’t remember the
first time he wanted to wear one, but I’m guessing it had to do with the players.
They were the giants down the
street. To him I’m sure it seemed
they just magically showed up on that diamond we could see from our front yard,
just a house down the block and across the street. We didn’t even notice it when we moved in, but it turned out
to be my son’s field of dreams.
Every day as soon as the weather turned warm from the time he was two to
about four years old, he would repeat the mantra, “Let’s go see the
players.” It was like he was the
tide being pulled by the moon; he just had to get over to see those players.
So, almost daily we would load up
his baby brother in the wagon and make the journey to watch from high atop a
hill as game after game unfolded on the field below. Always, the constant in our trips was that ball cap marching
ahead of me eagerly leading the way.
Or if I sat with his sleeping brother, I could watch that cap making
it’s way along the fences, bobbing past the spectators to get a closer
look.
And now I’m standing here on this familiar hill looking for
another hat. This time it
belongs to one of the players, not a giant, but he’s taller than me. He has that same march in his step and
the same blue eyes and has returned to the scene of so many dreams
dreamed. From up here I can spot
his hat as he steps onto the field over on that side of the fence for the first
time, one of the players, and I know the moment is lost on him. But it’s a big one for me. And in that instant, I can almost see a
little cap moving around the fences to sneak a little closer look. Just for a moment it feels surreal. And
it’s in that little snippet of time that I know for sure no matter how many
hats I wear, none will ever compare to the other hats in my life.
