When
the foul ball came screaming toward me at an end-of-season Red Wings game, I
wasn’t paying attention. I hadn’t liked the way the game was going, so I had
turned away. Rather than root for my team and risk being disappointed, I
watched people frolicking in the hot tub out beyond right field.

This
uncharacteristic indifference plagued me all summer, and it wasn’t limited to
my sports viewing. Worn down by the steady stream of bad news about this
country — the scathing 9/11 report, the mounting casualties in Iraq, the
flat-lined economy — and being powerless to help, I had started to feel
disenfranchised. Unpatriotic even.

What’s
the point of having a Constitution, I thought as I drove my family to my gay
aunts’ house to celebrate the 4th of July, if Bush can try to manipulate it to
deny rights? Why can’t this American lesbian couple have the same rights as
other couples? I had reread the Bill of Rights (don’t be impressed, we have a
big, illustrated Constitution that makes it almost seem like fun) searching for
amendments of similar malice. There aren’t any. And then I just pouted; what
else could I do?

Call
it Hot-tubocracy: the tendency of jaded Americans to steer their attention away
from politics (or losing sports teams) toward things that are not in the least
bit depressing. Here are a few safe topics: How you discovered Arrested Development before anyone else.
Hanky Panky’s 4811, the sexy and
comfortable thong featured in a recent front-page Wall Street Journal story. And, of course, hot tubs at baseball
games.

The scuffle
and cries of
the little boys raising their baseball mitts turned my attention to the ball, a
dozen yards away and gunning right for me. Time slowed and I saw my last few
moments on earth play out in a Frontier Field version of the Zapruder film.

To
my left, my friend dove on top of her identical-twin tots. The ball sped toward
me in slo-mo. Behind me the boys jostled each other. I covered my face. To my
right my oblivious husband gazed through his binoculars at the hot tub crowd.
(He would later claim he hadn’t even seen the hot tub and was, in fact,
“establishing a perimeter.”)

The
ball grew larger, spinning. I turned away. POW! The thing caught me full force
on the hip. It landed an inch above my jeans which, if they hadn’t been
freakin’ trendy low-rise, might have offered some protection. As it was, the
ball smacked my midriff with such a loud sound that I was sure an organ had
exploded.

That
snapped me out of my malaise. All my senses sprang to life — my pain sense
especially — and I became hyperaware of my surroundings. POW! I was blind but
now I see. It was a beautiful evening. The air was warm and dry, a purple-blue
dusk settled around us, and a train chugged by on the elevated track in front
of the downtown skyline. I breathed in the smell of popcorn mingled with
Rohrbach’s blueberry beer. America in all its glory.

As
people made a fuss over me — handing me ice packs, asking how I was, and
stowing the binoculars sheepishly — I felt part of something larger again.
Part of America. I had turned my back on the game, and by extension, my
country. When I took that ball to the hip, POW! I became a born-again American.
My new mantra: Keep an eye on the ball. In sports and in life.

Baseball, like
democracy, requires participation. And not just of the players; the fans have to
participate, too. In a ballpark there are no passive observers. Spectators need
to keep their eye on the ball and protect themselves.

Ditto
in a democracy. There are no passive observers. If you don’t participate, you
could be beaned at any time. By the massive layoffs spurred by companies moving
offshore. By the loss of health insurance. By feds stomping on your — or your
neighbors’ — civil liberties.

With
my patriotism revived and an ice pack pressed to my side, I left the ballpark
surrounded by friends and family. The crowd in our section cheered for me. One
yuckster called out, “How’s the ball?”

I
was eager to restart my life as an involved American. Should I donate?
Volunteer? Both? Then someone asked if I would sue Frontier Field. Of course.
What could be more American than suing the bastards? Oh, the pain. The
suffering. I’ll never be the same!

It
turns out, however, that you can’t sue when a ball hits you in the stands.
Lawyers point out that fans assume a certain risk when they enter the ballpark.
With balls flying everywhere, they should know what they’re in for. (Now, when
a chair flies into the stands, as one
did in Oakland recently, that’s another story.)

As
in baseball, the high-stakes game of American democracy carries an assumption
of risk. There’s always the risk your candidate or referendum won’t win. Fans
can protect themselves with baseball mitts. Citizens can protect themselves by
voting.

It’s
true that once you start to care about something — the election, the war, the
economy — you risk being disappointed if things don’t work out. But consider
the alternative. People living in dictatorships or under military regimes
assume no risk — the system ensures that they’ll be oppressed. It’s not
enough to just live in a democracy.
You have to live it. Keep your eye on
the ball. Play for keeps. And I, for one, will always bring a mitt to Frontier
Field. Okay, maybe the binoculars, too.

This article appears in Oct 13-19, 2004.