Getting Interested in Getting Interested: Superbowl Sunday and my 80th Birthday

This Blog was written the morning of February 9, 2025

Today is my 80^th birthday.

It’s also Super Bowl Sunday.

When my husband asked me, with an undercurrent of fear in his voice, what I had wanted to do for my birthday, I thought about it some. Then I said, “Let’s all watch the Superbowl!” Our daughter was coming over as well, and she loves watching games. So does Pat, who we invited, a close musician friend we’ve known well for a long time.

Don was so happy!

I wasn’t always into football or baseball, for that matter. At all. Until one year when I realized I was moping and griping, around the house, “complaining that the world” (in this case my husband) “would not devote (himself) to making me happy,” to quote George Bernard Shaw.

It was baseball season, April had arrived, and I lost my husband to baseball.

My husband is generally totally supportive. I mean, if they made a French perfume out of the essence of Don, it would be called “Parfum du Support.”

But baseball season is another matter. Once the baseball season starts, football too, (but baseball he devotes more frequent time to). Nobody messes with that.

So, here I am almost every night, moaning and groaning, miserable, suffering, making my husband wrong, and generally being a “clod of ailments and grievances,” to quote Shaw once again. What was my internal dialogue? “He doesn’t care about me. He doesn’t support me. If he really loved me he wouldn’t be watching baseball all the time.”

And then, I woke up.

I realized I was running a number in my head, and not an empowering one at that, making myself miserable. I saw that if I wanted to enjoy Don’s companionship, during this time of year, I’d better get interested in baseball.

That would be better than being pissed off all the time.

Except I wasn’t interested in baseball.

“Okay,” I said to myself, “Well, at the very least, what you can do is get interested in getting interested in baseball.”

This is a principle in development, that when someone really needs to go into development to create a new reality for themselves, or break themselves up on behalf of a larger possibility, they first have to get interested in doing so. If they are not interested, they have to get interested in getting interested.

I knew this. I teach this. I am committed to living what I teach.

So, I looked at how I could get interested. I thought about it. “I know,” I said to myself. “I could have Don take me to a game – and see what, about the game, I could get interested in!”

“Let’s go to a baseball game.” I said to Don.

“WHAT?????” He practically screamed in my ear.

And go to a game we did.

The Mariner Moose Mascot

Fortunately, the year was 1995. We live on an island across from Seattle, and the Mariners had an amazing team: Randy Johnson, Ken Griffey, Alex Rodriguez, Edgar Martinez, and Dan Wilson…a star-studded cast.

It was the perfect year to get interested in baseball.

Before we left home that day, I made one commitment to myself: I would enjoy myself. I wouldn’t do anything I didn’t enjoy. I was committed to fun.

The day of the game was warm and beautiful. The first thing I saw after they took our tickets was a hot dog stand. I love hot dogs, and they had New York dogs too. So, I bought a hot dog and piled it high with mustard, sauerkraut, and onions. Yum! I was happy.

A little later, on the way to our seats, I saw a beer stand, so I bought myself some beer. Now I had both beer and a hot dog. What could be better?

Our seats were pretty darn good. They were about 20 rows up, a little to the right of the third baseline. The day was sunny, and there were lots and lots of people around. In fact, that day, the stadium held 50,000 fans.

A short while after I started enjoying my hot dog, I noticed a woman near me stand up and put her right hand high into the air. Meanwhile, people in the whole row were passing money towards a man who had his hand behind his back, and from the hand behind his back, he threw something into this woman's raised right arm. I was so surprised! I asked Don, “What's that about?” He said, “Oh, that man is selling peanuts that are wrapped in aluminum foil.” I was blown away.

I asked Don if I could do the same thing, though I never believed I would ever be able to catch the peanuts. He said, “Sure.” I stood up. and we started passing the money down and, oh my god. Those peanuts landed right into my palm. I couldn't believe it!

And I love peanuts. So, there I was, quite happy, eating my hot dog, (with sauerkraut), drinking my beer, and eating peanuts. I threw the shells on the ground. It seemed to be part of the culture.

All of a sudden, everyone stood up. Don told me to stand. “Why?” I asked. “Because we are going to sing the Star-Spangled Banner.”

Now, considering myself somewhat of an ex-hippy non-conformist, I was a bit resistant to this. Nevertheless, I reluctantly stood up, like everyone else. Then I started singing with everyone else. Like everyone else, I found my hand on my heart. Like everyone else, I found myself in a community with everyone else. And like everyone else, I started realizing how much I appreciate living in America.

In that one moment, I felt a new sense of belonging, belonging to the Community. I shifted from seeing myself as separate from the world to being at one with, connected to, each and every human being in that stadium. We were One.

Tears rolled down my cheek.

My heart swelled.

“Okay,” I said to Don. “We can go home now.”

Don said, “The game hasn’t started.”

We stayed.

I found it fascinating. There was this young man, Alex, who kept “sneaking” off of first base each time he arrived at first base. Don told me that what Alex was doing was called “stealing.”

I started getting the jargon. I entered the world of “Baseball Speak.”

I thought it was so sweet each time a runner reached first or third base, the way the men were bonding with one another, particularly with the pat on the “tuchus,” a good Jewish word for “rear end.” Don told me about the first and third base coaches and what they were there for.

Don talked to me throughout the game. He pointed out the positioning of players, or why the shortstop got so close in at a certain point, how we could tell a bunt was coming, why a pitcher intentionally walked a player, and how the pitcher and catcher communicated. That day, as I gained new insight into the language of baseball, I entered that world. I entered Don’s world. And I expanded my own.

The next week, I was leading a course in Corvallis. Don was at home. That Wednesday night, there was a game. Back in my hotel room, I watched the game. Of course! During the second inning, Griffey hit a homer. I called Don up on the phone and said, “How about that homer Griffey just hit?”

In total surprise, he yelled “WHAT? You’re watching the game?” And, of course, I was watching the game.

I no longer have any upsets whenever baseball season arrives at our relationship's doorstep. After all, I get to enjoy life with my husband.

And today, I get to spend my birthday, watching the Superbowl with him!

We go to Spring training in Phoenix

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If you are inspired by and/ or contributed to this post, I invite you to share it with others that you care about through email or social media.

Please know this story, as well as Don’s cancer story, and many other, teaching stories, will be in my next book, currently scheduled to be launched next year, 2026, whose working title is “The Heart of Sacred Listening: The Key to Transforming Your Relationships, Your Work and Your Life.” Hold on to your (proverbial) hat!!!