Searching for a Memory (Simply a Moment in May)

May 16, 2013, 2:15 p.m.
It's after noon on a weekday, but I'm still in my pajamas. Red flannel pajama pants with an out-of-season Christmas motif and an oversized yellow t-shirt. I'm sitting on our bed, surrounded by Henry's scrapbooks, hunting for a picture I know exists. It the photograph of his very first baseball team: t-ball at age four or five. 
I can see it in my mind . . . he's sitting on the dirt surrounded by friends. So tiny, so cute, so happy. I'm searching because last night at dinner, after their last baseball game (yes, they lost, so it was their last game), we began talking about how long these boys have been playing together.  And which combinations of these nine incredible High School seniors were on those first t-ball teams, all those All Star teams, the teams that went to Cooperstown, etc. I keep flipping through his albums, feeling frustrated in the dim light of our bedroom. It's a foggy, grey day outside.  The dogs are sleeping nearby.  Paul has gone off to get Clara from school.  I'm alone with my thoughts, drifting down memory lane.
I see soccer pictures, basketball pictures, baseball pictures, and in each of the photos, so many of the same faces over and over. There's Henry and Cole, Reese and Peter, dribbling down the basketball court or posing in front of the goal.  I get to the scrapbook with the High School photos and realize that obviously I passed the t-ball photo some time ago.  I pick up his preschool album again, flip it open and finally find the memory I've been searching for:

There's Henry, third from the left, dwarfed by his hat.  The boy on the far left, Austin, is the same boy who's standing just to Henry's right in the Senior photo which Becky gave me last night. The girl in the sunglasses on the far right in the t-ball photo is Chandra, still a good friend, though she now plays softball not baseball.  Looking through the albums I realize why the end of baseball means so much. Although these boys all played baseball and basketball and soccer together through middle school, once they reached High School, they dropped some sports and tended to specialize. Henry was the only one who continued with soccer. Peter took up football. Cole and Reese played a few years of basketball.  But, through all four years of High School, they all played baseball.  
Each spring, they reunited on the diamond with their friends - the same boys who they grew up with, with whom they learned to pitch and field; the same boys with whom they did science fair projects and school plays; the ones who were there for birthday celebrations and trips to prom.  
Through it all, there's been baseball.  Their constant. Their bond. 
And now it's over. 
But they'll always have their memories. 
And, as I heft the albums back onto the book shelves, I am grateful that I have the photos.
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