Previous Challenge Entry (Level 2 – Intermediate)
Topic: ADAGE (10/05/23)
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TITLE: Making Men | Previous Challenge Entry
By Ellen Janson
10/12/23 -
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Andrew’s car was mauled as he pulled in the driveway - not only by our kids, but by some neighborhood players as well - word must’ve spread. He was a celebrity. The boys all donned still clean little league baseball caps on their sweaty heads, and had all the equipment out or in hand. “OK, guys. Hang on. I need to say “hi” to mommy and change my clothes,” my husband fought his way to the door.
This was the start of my husband’s coaching career. He was so into it, his excitement was contagious. “Big game tonight, boys,” he would comment as he left for work in the morning. They would agree in unison over their cereal bowls, and start practicing in the backyard as soon as they got home from school or out of their pajamas.
With four boys, one more into baseball than the next, Andrew coached every season for 10 years. We practically lived at the ballpark during baseball season, and he developed quite a reputation. We got to know almost every boy, and their “story”, between the ages of six and 14 in our small town. Andrew was so good with them, their parents would often ask if they could send their son to our house for “discipline”. They saw how much the boys respected him.
But he wasn’t easy on them - this respect was earned through Andrew’s absolute pouring into them. If the boys weren’t paying attention in the dugout, he would reprimand them to pay attention and support their teammates. If the score was close and they were down, he would tell them all to put on their “rally caps” (an inside out baseball cap). If they had a hard loss and they hadn’t played well, he would show them that they needed to work harder. If they had a big win, he would celebrate with them.
He talked so much about his own hometown team, that many of his players became St. Louis Cardinal’s baseball fans - often much to their parent’s dismay. Sometimes he would pour over “stats” at the kitchen table with our boys - as if they were playing professional baseball. He made them feel so “big”, and treated their games as important as the boys really believed they were.
As our boys got older, they moved on to other things - still enjoying watching the sport, but no longer playing. Occasionally we run into one of Andrew’s old players, who are now men. I am always amazed at how joyful this reunion is. “Coach!” they still refer to him, beaming as they approach him. His excitement matches theirs. A parent of one of these players once commented that my husband hadn’t just been coaching baseball, he had been “making men”.
It truly is better to give than receive.
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Be careful about overusing punctuation. Save the quotation marks for dialog. If you feel you occasionally need to show the word isn't meant exactly as one would think, you could say their so-called stories. Personally, other than dialog, I don't think any of the words or phrases you put in quotation marks needed them. Be careful about overusing punctuation like that and things like exclamation points (which you didn't really do, but is a temptation many can't resist), and em dashes. All of these can be distracting to the reader. And don't forget to use hyphen for when you combine several words to make one adjective: eight-year-old boy, inside-out cap. (That also cuts down on the word count since a hyphenated word or phrase is generally counted as one word.) Another important thing is consistency. Some rules say write out numbers up to a hundred, others say to ten, but make sure you use numerals or write out numbers the same way, especially in the same sentence or paragraph. I think you have a nice beginning and ending. I enjoyed the read from beginning to end, and I see tons of potential in this charming tale. You did an excellent job of delivering a clear message that we can all relate to. I look forward to reading more of your stories.