Spring has not officially arrived, but there are signs that the season is not far off. There are sounds of bats cracking baseballs and softballs, and jasmine bushes are showing new green leaves.
When the Springhill Sports started getting ready for their season in the Big Eight League, kids in our neighborhood knew it was close to springtime.
The distinctive echoes of the first batting practice at the green ballpark drifted the quarter of a mile down Second Street to our little frame house. That pulled me to the park like a magnet.
Members of that semi-pro team wore real flannel uniforms and shoes with metal cleats. We could watch practice for free and get tickets in the left field bleachers for a quarter on game days.
It was not the Major Leagues. The players worked part-time at the paper mill to pay their summer living expenses. They played teams from Bernice and Bastrop instead of New York and Boston.
But it was big-time baseball to all of us boys who dreamed of growing up and playing for the Yankees. They gave us their scuffed-up baseballs and broken bats, and we used them every day in our backyard ballgames.
The beginning of baseball was a signal that spring was coming. We could go barefoot again after being confined over the long winter to shoes that shackled our feet and stymied our freedom.
We could feel the red dirt and pea gravel on the street between our toes again and wade in the drainage ditch at the end of the road and the cement goldfish pond where we never once saw a goldfish.
Our bicycles had been laid up in the garage for the winter. We got them out, oiled the chains, pumped up the tires and rode them to the ballpark when the roads were dry.
My dad took me to the mill ponds when winter started breaking to look for new bream fishing spots. We searched for openings in the reeds along the shallow banks where fish might bed up.
He got new cane poles, hooks, corks and sinkers and dug around in the black dirt by the chicken yard to make sure we would have plenty of worms for the spawning season.
Some of us had summer jobs at the city swimming pool. At the first hint of spring, we scrubbed the sprawling pool, filled it and dumped in the chlorine to have the water clear and warm before the recreation center opened.
There was a softball field by the pool for kids’ games and adult fast-pitch leagues. Every time a huge man named Babe on the phone company team came to bat, they told us to clear the pool.
We blew whistles and got everybody out of the water and against the fence by the softball outfield. Babe usually hit home runs over our heads into the pool and onto the decks surrounding it.
From the lifeguard stand, home plate looked a mile away. I don’t remember any other player hitting a ball into the pool. But Babe was a powerful guy who shimmied up and down telephone poles to work on utility lines for a living.
I still love watching softball in the springtime whether it’s my grandkids tapping slow grounders that won’t reach the pitcher or a college player smashing a homer into the left field stands.
My folks turned on the attic fan at night when it started warming up in the spring, and that sucked the sweet scent of the jasmine flowers in our yard into my bedroom.
There is a jasmine bush near the building where I work. When the white flowers pop out on it, I walk around it on sunny afternoons and soak up the fragrance and the memories.
When I grew up and had kids of my own, my dad liked to visit in the springtime. He enjoyed riding in the ski boat and watching his grandkids jump the waves.
He looked forward to the warm spring days when we bream fished and frog hunted on Cane River and fried the fish on the riverbank. Spring energizes people of all ages.
This wet, dismal winter has been stubborn but is starting to let go. There are baseballs and butterflies in the air, and going barefoot, bream fishing and the scent of jasmine won’t be far behind. The purple martins will be back soon, and our spirits will be lifted.
REPRINTED FROM THE NATCHITOCHES TIMES