family ties

My brother had his heart bypass surgery on Thursday and came through with flying colors. We are so happy, relieved and grateful for modern technology! The recovery from this surgery is tough and lasts several months. I am confident though that a few months from now he will be back to how he was before, active and living a full life. One of the positive things that comes from a crisis like this is how it brings a family closer together and reminds you how much you mean to each other. My three brothers in the picture above spent a lot of time when they were young playing in little league. Baseball was a big part of our family life and it bonded my brothers. My middle brother Bob (middle in the picture above too) remembered a baseball moment from when they were young and posted it on Bill's facebook page. He was having a hard time after the surgery with all the pain and this story brought back to life those happy days for him. It is such a sweet story I wanted to share it here.

I was thinking about when we were kids, and Bill was a pitcher on a Little League team called the Knights. My Dad, the manager of the Knights, drafted me onto the same team, although at nine years old I had no business on it.

Anyway, I vividly remember one game where Bill was just dealing. Throwing a no-hitter. (Guys were swinging at his curves in the dirt, and I made a mental note that I would later use.) I was playing second base, with knees knocking. I prayed, "Please God, I don't want to mess up my brother's big game, please don't let them hit it to me."

They didn't. My prayers, however underachieving they might have been, were answered.

At the end, we mobbed him on the mound. We were a pack of happy kids, and Bill was at the center of it all. Great memories...
story: Bob Chapman
photo: by me