So anyone who has lived in a small town knows how it is in a small town. Everyone knows each others business, and everyone knows the "big names" in the town. In a small town your reputation starts when you are young, and it depends on what your last name is. Well you see I moved into that small town when I was ten, and I didn't have the right last name. Essentially, I was no one. So when I started playing baseball in that small town, I didn't get to play much. I wasn't a bad player by any means, granted I wasn't a super star either but I was better than some of the kids out there on the field. So, it was the same story all up into middle school. My seventh grade year I didn't even bother trying out for the team because I had almost given up on the whole baseball scene in that town. However my eighth grade year I was convinced to try out for the team and to my surprise I made the team, but again I thought it would be like all the other seasons I had played in that town. Again to my surprise, the coach was all about winning and he put whoever he thought was going to win out on the field, and guess what? I played! Still to this day I admire that man, because he had the guts to play who he wanted, he didn't care who he made mad. That year my faith was restored, so come the next year I tried out for the high school team, and I didn't make the cut, so as you could imagine I was devastated. It tore me to pieces that I didn't make the team, yet people that weren't as good as me made the team and I didn't. I questioned my self a lot that year, I didn't think that I was ever going to play baseball again, and it hurt, it hurt worst than anything. So come the next year when it came about that time for baseball to start up I was still upset and had many doubts, but my father always told me that quitting wasn't an option. So I tried out for that team again, and when it came time for cuts my stomach was tore up. This year it was different though, instead of the coach calling everyone into a separate room to tell you if you made the team, he posted a piece of paper on the wall with the people who had made the team. So as I walked down the hall to the coach's office where the paper was posted on his door. I couldn't breathe, I was so nervous I just knew that I didn't make the team. I eventually made my way down the hall, and too the paper, I started from the top reading down the list and I saw all the names of the people I knew would be there, and at the very bottom of the list, there was my name! I had made the team! I'm not going to lie I didn't expect it to be there, I had to read the list again to make sure I wasn't lying to myself and again my name was at the bottom of the list! My hard work had paid off I was on the team, so I worked hard, every hard to make sure that I played when it was game time. I worked the hardest no a single person on that team worked harder than me, but when it came game time I didn't play. I didn't understand this, isn't hard work supposed to pay off? I was dumbfounded, I couldn't understand. I even practiced with the starters, yet come game time I was on the bench. So I had a plan, that summer I went to the next town over and played American legion baseball. For those of you that don't know, American legion baseball is for baseball players who wanted to play more into the summer. Only the better players from the high schools got the chance to play on those teams and I made it. Not only did I make the team, I played I was a pitcher and I closed every game, I got to play every game that season. So the next year come high school I had made the team the year before which means I was automatically on the team I didn't have o try out again, but still I didn't get to play. That summer though I couldn't go to the other town and play legion ball, but I made the team in this town, but I didn't get to play. The next year was the same story, I was on both teams but I didn't get to play, that was my senior year and I didn't even play. That was the last year that I was eligible to play baseball, it was gone, the sport that I had spent so many years practicing and the last year that I could play I was confined to the bench. So I began to resent the coaches that had done this to me, I was so mad, not only at them, but at my self. I was mad at myself because I had let this happen to me, I felt like I had wasted all that time. Those couple weeks were terrible I couldn't sleep at night, it was eating me up that I had spend all that time practicing just to sit the bench. So a couple weeks after my final season of baseball it was time for me to leave that small town, but before I left I went back to the baseball field where I spent most of my afternoons and weekends, practicing and sitting the bench. So I sat there on that bench for one last time, and I watched the sun set on that beautiful field, and a tear ran down my left cheek. I'll never forget that moment, that was the moment that I realized that all the time I spend on that field was not wasted. I sat on that bench and cried like a little girl, I remembered all the good times that I had on that field, all the friends I made and all that great moments that I wouldn't have had without that field. As I sat there all the hate that I had for those coaches, it all turned into love. I no longer hated them because I knew then that I wouldn't be the man that I am today without those coaches. They say that you'll miss it when its gone, and I do I miss it more than anything. So as I sat there and wiped away my tears, I realized that even though I didn't get to play much, I wouldn't have had it any other way. Later that night when I got home, I thanked my parents for making me stay with it, because without them I would have quit a long time before that. It's funny though, now I live over 600 miles away from that baseball field yet every single night I think of that baseball field. I miss it more than anything, I think of it every second of everyday, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
- William Ruffalo
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