Spring

Spring has sprung, equinox and all, but I truly celebrated the first day of spring yesterday. I went to a baseball game.
The Utes defeated BYU 8-4 with an exciting 2 run 7th and 4 run 8th. This proved that the Utes could defeat BYU this academic year and that baseball on the first day of spring is one of the finest things imaginable. If you want the box score I tracked it down here on the U's site. Though if someone could explain to me how BYU can't be a conference game I'd appreciate it, though I see that they're playing in Provo for the last games before the MWC tournament.
I counted 125-130 people in their seats when the game started at 6, but there were probably 250-300 at the peak. The official attendance was 396, but that just doesn't feel right - must've been ticket buyers who were scared off by the few raindrops and the chance of more.
The concessions were weak (just like Franklin Covey Field's have been for the Bees the last few years) -- no coffee on a rainy spring night? No hot chocolate for the kids and BYU fans? What were they thinking? I'm not even going to go into my issues with the lack of peanuts....
Despite my love of the mighty Utes and baseball, this is the first U. baseball game I've ever been to. It goes to show that advertising works -- I saw the largish ad in the Tribune and decided that that sounded much more fun than waiting for Spring Training highlights on ESPN. I was so right about that you can't imagine. I just may have to go to a few more U games, at least until the Bees start up on April 5.
College baseball sounds wrong with its aluminum bats going "ping" instead of the "thwack" of wood, but it smells right. But more than all of that it was baseball on the first day of spring. And that's what matters, more than poetry, more than iced tea. My Tigers head the AL in Spring Training and my Brewers aren't in the cellar, but it's only Spring Training and none of this matters come April 1.
And on that note I've decided to include one of my favorite spring poems, though it has nothing to do with baseball:

in Just-
spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman

whistles far and wee

and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it's
spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer
old balloonman whistles
far and wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's
spring
and
the

goat-footed

balloonMan whistles
far
and
wee

e.e. cummings

Oh, and I love the countdown to the first pitch clock on mlb.com 10 days, 21 hours and some change as I hit post.