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The Last Place You Want To Be

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The Boston Red Sox season has been dismal, which prompted Bill Littlefield to remember another time when he picked dinner over watching the Sox at Fenway. (Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)
The Boston Red Sox season has been dismal, which prompted Bill Littlefield to remember another time when he picked dinner over watching the Sox at Fenway. (Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)

Friends were coming into Boston to visit, a family of three, or maybe four if the daughter as well as the son showed up. Nobody was sure, but there were enough tickets so whoever showed up could go to the ballgame, which was good, because the three members of the family, or four, were coming from at least three different directions, maybe four.

Then it started to rain.

Two things can happen to a ballgame when it starts to rain. The ballgame can be postponed, which is no good if you can’t make it on the rain date, or the ballgame can be played in the rain, which is also no good, if you’re there.

Bill Littlefield

Two things can happen to a ballgame when it starts to rain. The ballgame can be postponed, which is no good if you can’t make it on the rain date, or the ballgame can be played in the rain, which is also no good, if you’re there.

Also it was cold.

One of the visitors was coming in on a flight from Chicago, which she didn’t, because the rain cancelled the flight. So she took a plane to New York that only got to Allentown, Pennsylvania, where she rented a car and drove the rest of the way to New York, so that was one down.

The other one in Chicago decided to stay where she was. The one driving from Allentown probably wished she had done that.

Then there was the guy driving across Massachusetts, who got stopped behind an accident, which, maybe it was the weather and maybe not, because by the time he got to the scene, it was just some sand getting wet on the highway in the rain.

Which it was still doing late in the afternoon, so those of us who had made it to the gathering which was supposed to feature a ballgame, figured the ballgame was off and went out to dinner, where it was dry and the rigatoni toscano was terrific, and the mushrooms, as well. I tried one.

And then somebody pulled out a phone and fiddled with it for a minute and said, “They’re playing.”

“They” meant the Red Sox, and they were playing in the rain, which, as it turned out, didn’t treat them any better than the sunshine or the moonlight had been treating them, which is one reason I did not regret for a moment that I was in a warm, dry restaurant with those who were not driving to New York or still in Chicago, and not at Fenway Park.

The other reason was the rigatoni.

The Red Sox lost that night, 4-2, which is not so bad. The previous night they’d lost 13-10, and a couple nights earlier they lost 13-5, and you do not win often when the other team scores 13, though you can also lose when you allow four runs if you only score two.

This is the kind of baseball season it has been here in Boston, which would be sad if it were not for places like the one in which I was eating rigatoni while the home team was losing in the rain, and I would suggest you try that, too, except then the next time I go there it might be crowded.

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Headshot of Bill Littlefield

Bill Littlefield Host, Only A Game
Bill Littlefield was the host of Only A Game from 1993 until 2018.

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