LJ Idol 1: Do you hear the crowd? They're cheering for you.

[bewize]

There is a moment in a baseball game when the people in the stands fall silent and lean forward on their seats with anticipation. The players focus narrow to one man, the pitcher, as his entire focus is on one other man, the batter.

For a second, they stare at each other, taking each other's measure, a mental battle of wills of who wants it the most. Then, the pitcher narrows his eyes, the batter breathes out slowly, and the real game begins.

The pitcher slowly looks around at the bases to check for runners. Then, he kicks up his leg, pulls back his arm and prays to whichever god he believes in. This, baseball fans, is known as the Wind Up.

The beauty of a wind up doesn't come from a perfectly delivered pitch. The beauty of the wind up is that no one knows what is going to happen, but in the unknown there is a perfect hope – the hope that the pitcher will strike out the batter, the hope that the batter will hit a home run, the hope that something extraordinary will happen.

Many times, this isn't true. The pitch will be ruled outside of fair territory, the hit will fall outside of the foul poles. Sometimes, the pitch hits the batter. Sometimes, things go really wrong and the batter ends up rushing the pitcher, both teams clear the dug outs, the pitchers race onto the field from the bull pens hoping that they don't miss all the action, and the fans stand and scream obscenities.

I don't know about the rest of you, but this is a pretty apt analogy for my life. Let's take this week, for example. Every morning, I woke up to the sound of my new cell phone's alarm. For a few minutes, I lay in bed and stare at the ceiling. My thoughts shift gradually from the complete and utter disbelief that it's morning to coffee. From there, I start thinking about work and the list of tasks adorning my TO DO list, which I know even before I start, won't get finished.

But, there's a moment where I have this unbridled hope that things may go my way. (If you're a regular visitor on my f-list, you are laughing right about now.) Maybe I'll settle that case. Maybe my clients will call up and tell me that everything is going well. Maybe everyone else will behave for just one day.

It's about the only thing that gets me out of bed.

This week, it's been all foul balls and bench clearing brawls. Still, I hold out hope for next week that things will go my way. It's the magic moment of the Wind Up, when anything is still possible. So, I will narrow my eyes, breathe out slowly, and let the real game begin.

And if the next pitch sucks?

I'll still sit comfortably with the knowledge that a single pitch does not a baseball game make.

Can you hear the crowd in the distance?

I can.

This entry was written for Topic 1: Winding Up at therealljidol. I assume voting will take place later this week. Everyone should check out all the good entries!