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Published Saturday, November 12, 2011 in Opinion

From a hometown library to the big leagues

Before becoming an avid Georgia Bulldog fan, I was first a Boston Red Sox fan. It came about down on the farm, before the family subscribed to a newspaper and before I knew there was a town named Athens in our state.

In fact, I think I heard of Boston before I heard of Atlanta. How the Hub, or Bean Town, came into my reality circle had something to do with my hometown county library and big league baseball. While we actually lived five miles or so out in the country, Saturday brought about one of the two biggest social events in our week. Most rural families worked a half day on Saturday and then grocery shopped in the afternoon. (The other social highlight was Sunday afternoon church, the timing of which brought about penetrating agony when it interfered with listening to the World Series -- but not for the fundamentalist members, who thought that those playing baseball on Sunday had no chance of escaping the horrors of hell.)

There was nothing sinful about spending Saturday afternoon searching for the best prices at the Piggly Wiggly, however. At the time, I didn't appreciate the frugality with which my parents used to choose those items that were taken home to go with the ample peas and butterbeans from our expansive garden. But hopping aboard the pickup truck and heading into town meant one treasured thing -- I could spend the afternoon at the county library.

Although librarians are no doubt embracing technology, I fear that libraries will someday face extinction because of it. In my youth, there was nothing greater than to go into a library and see all those books neatly lined up in shelves along the wall. And those books introduced me to the Red Sox.

One thing I would bet on is that if more kids spent more time at the library than they do with gadgets, their interest in learning would be heightened dramatically. Turn off the television. Give a kid a book. Show a kid the globe and remind him that the world in these technological times is next door.

While I don't sit under a shade tree and engage in reruns of my past, quite often I recall those Saturday afternoons in the library, and now, with the weather taking on its welcomed chills, I have a daily reminder of my past, which is downright heartwarming.

When I take my early morning walk, I put on my beautiful Red Sox jacket, at team issue, a gift from a friend who is a Boston announcer, Dave O'Brien. He learned of my passion for the Red Sox when he worked at WSB. We keep in touch. Last summer when I met him at Fenway Park, he said as I was leaving, "You are going to get something in the mail I think you will like."

When the package arrived during the robust heat of the dog days of August, its opening was bittersweet because then I could only admire the jacket. But fast-forward to the first morning in October, when it was comfortable to walk with a heavy long sleeve, and I was overjoyed. It made me think of the past, which I appreciate more and more. Life on the farm was good. I just didn't know it. The austere times meant that I learned to appreciate reading. I developed an imagination and dreamed of going to Boston, never once thinking it would happen.

When I get up and put on my beautiful Red Sox jacket in the morning, I fondly recall a breakfast of sizzling sausage, which we made ourselves; a lunch of peas and butterbeans from our garden; and a radio, which brought more static than dulcet tones. But that radio also brought us news, country music and -- best of all -- the Mutual Big League Game of the Day on Saturday afternoons.

That was before I met Frank Sinkwich and Charley Trippi and other Georgia legends, who now have priority in the rankings in my emotions bank. It's just that your first memories -- like first loves -- make the biggest impression.

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