It was love at first sight for me, a one-way love but
still a passion that could not be denied. There she
was, for all budding athletes to see, but staring at me
from a window of the sporting goods establishment
a good mile from where I lived, her rich mellow brown
curves whispering to me that we belonged together.
And I offered no resistance – – – until I saw her price:
Twenty dollars! (That would translate to $229.77 in
today’s money: I Googled it.) So close, yet for a time
beyond my reach . . . but to true love, obstacles are
a temporary challenge, serving only to enrich the full
experience; we were meant to be a team (or at least,
part of a winning team). I stared and smiled and
fantasized about our coming union, our unrestrained
though yet to be realized tender first physical contact,
and I whispered her name . . . Rawlings . . . and I
told her mine (in my thoughts and in my soul).
It took me several molasses-moving weeks to save
my single dollar weekly allowances to accumulate the
Scrooge McDuck fortune of twenty dollars so that
I could purchase that dream glove and call her mine.
On that day (memorialized by me forever), I trudged
from my Bronx apartment house, through the wilds
of Parkchester, across the mean streets, avoiding
several cars, passing the 43rd Precinct, and finally
arriving at the store which had imprisoned my love —
I mean, my glove! I took her home, plied her with
oil enriched with lanolin and aloe, shaped her pocket
to my desire, and for several days watched over her
as she warmly caressed a baseball in her budding
pocket, secured with rubber bands. When at last we
were a happy couple, we played well together, a
match made in left field, for many seasons; we
had been destined from the first time my eyes met
her eyelets; we spent several scintillating seasons
together; we had been destined to fit as one. We
completed each other, working hand in glove to
defeat the enemy. Now that I am old, she is but a
memory, but I will always remember her; after all,
she was, as I said, my first true love . . .
I mean, glove.