drum-roll, please.

I can't hold it in any longer. I've tried all my life to enjoy baseball. I've tried many different self-manipulative strategies over the years to make myself like it: I've pretended, in hopes that real feelings and interest would come, I've liked it for the sake of friends who love it, I've eaten more than I thought possible at games just to keep from death by boredom. Once, I even made it a part of my old favorite rain-or-shine pastime: flirting. That was loads of fun, and the bat boy gave me a ball, but all this to no avail.

Like every normal American, I have some wonderful memories having to do with being taken to baseball games, that I would not trade for the world. But (as I am finally able to admit to myself) when I go to games, I enjoy everything but the game: the junk food, the jumbo-tron, the people-watching, the company of whoever I go with, but I could care less if there is baseball going on along with all that. In fact, I'd rather there not be. It distracts from conversation since those interested always have to pay attention to the game at all costs. And when, heaven forbid, I happen to be with someone who is watching baseball on TV, I find myself breathlessly looking forward to the commercials. At the end of summertime, when football and basketball are long gone and all that is happening is baseball, even my favorite sports radio station gets almost completely boring!

So, it is with unbridled relief that I announce, after nearly three decades of effort, farce and staunch denial, that I don't really like baseball! Football and hockey are wonderful, basketball keeps me entertained, and even golf is at least surrounded by beauty but, in my oh so relevant opinion, baseball in and of itself, without food and good company, does not quite make the cut to being called "interesting."