Ghost baseball

Did you ever play ghost baseball as a kid?

I guess we actually played softball not baseball. As a kid I grew up in the country. There were never enough people around to have a proper softball game. We played ghost softball. When there are not enough players, we made up imaginary players with fancy names and abilities. We never cared out stats, but the more creative the names and abilites the better. There were few rules except the players could not fly, or have super powers like that, they could however be great batters, catchers, or pitchers. The captain of the teams had to be a real person - either my sister, brother, or I. Every now and again cousins would come to visit and they could be the captain of the teams. The captian would hit, run, and hopefully score for the ghost player. The arguments ensued when the ghost player in the outfield caught the ball ensuring an out.

Because of all the practice hitting softballs as a kid, I was pretty good at hitting. That was about it though. I was not a quick runner (I ran long distance in track in high school), nor could I catch at all. The comic shows exactly why. I wore glasses and remember being admonished many times to protect those glasses - they cost lots of money!

Anyway, during gym in high school, in the spring, as soon as it was warm, we were outside playing sofball. All of the guys thought that girls could not hit a ball any distance. Through the normal heckling given a batter, I blasted the first ball into the outfield surprising everyone - including myself! I put one runner in to home! Yeah! The second time at bat, the guys moved to the outfield, so I bunted. I made it to first base that time too. Yeah Diana! The guys were upset that I bunted and made it to base. They didn' t have to worry though, I never made it farther than second base.

Ben