For the Love of the Game

Three days ago I made a dumb decision. I climbed into my brother's four door Honda Civic and decided to spend the next two days crammed inside a four passenger car with  four of my friends. Do the math that's five guys in a four seat car. It was one of the worst decisions of my life but it was completely worth it.  Our destination: Field of Dreams and Wrigley Field. 

About an hour into the trip between Jonathan Garner and David Jones I felt like getting out and walking. The trip ahead of us consisted of 1500 miles and almost 20 hours of driving. 

At our first stop to relieve some of the boredom Jonathan and I decided that at every stop we would throw the ball around.We threw at gas stations, restaurants, church parking lots and finally the ballpark -things like this made the drive bearable. 

We arrived in at our first stop- Devin Schadegg's church somewhere in Kansas at about 11 p.m. We enjoyed the break from driving and got back on the road at 7:30 a.m. 

After being on the road for almost 15 hours we arrived in Dyersville, Iowa where the movie "Field of Dreams" was filmed. 

We drove up to the house that is next to the baseball field and unloaded a bucket of balls and  a few bats.

The great thing about this day was that there wasn't anybody out there to stop us from playing an actual game on the field.

So we divided up and began to play. It was very surreal to be playing a game on the set of the most popular baseball movie ever made.  

Our travels continued with a four hour trip to Chicago where we stayed at a friend's house in their basement. The next morning started for us at 9 a.m. We drove about 45 min into the heart of downtown where we got our first look at Wrigley. It was awesome. We got off the bus right in front of the stadium and took in the sights and sounds. 

I've never experienced such a rich baseball culture- it felt like this was Game 7 of the World Series. Different than other stadiums Wrigley was full of passionate Cubs fans. Usually you see a lot of fans at games who are wearing polo shirts or other teams' logos but not here. Everyone was sporting some kind Cubs gear. 

It just doesn't much better than a day game at Wrigley Field. 

 We took some batting practice, bought hot dogs and found our seats just in time for the first pitch. The Cubs' ace Carlos Zambrano pitched well, Derek Lee hit a grand slam and the Cubs beat the Marlins 6-4.

 As we exited the stadium the jubilation of the Cubs win did not last long. The realization of

an 18 hour road trip back Abilene loomed. We decided to tough it out and drive through the night back to ACU. 

Again another stupid decision, but it made the trip that much more memorable. We got back at 10 a.m. just in time to watch the Wildcats play for the LSC title. 

3 days, 3000 miles and 2 unforgettable baseball experiences.