Itch for baseball getting stronger

The itch is inevitable.
Baseball is coming.
Sure, there’s March Madness ahead. And like every good Hoosier I’ll end up watching way too much basketball over the next several weeks.
But I’ll keep in mind that baseball lies ahead, a whole season of springtime and summer and possibilities stretches out before us.
Though I was never much of a player — hand-eye coordination seemed to have been left off my genetic menu — I’ve always loved the game.
And these days, much of what I love about it comes from memories.
Memories like:
•The first time I saw the electric green of the grass in a Major League infield. It was Crosley Field in Cincinnati, and I was with my father. Beyond that, beyond the stunning green and the fact that I was with my dad, nothing else matters
•A few summers when my older sister worked at a camp near Chicago and my brother and his wife lived in Evanston. Their proximity translated into a couple of trips to Wrigley — my first — and trips to old Comiskey as well.
•A train trip with my dad and my neighborhood buddy Don Starr from Fort Wayne to Chicago to see a White Sox game. I’ll never know what prompted my dad to book the excursion, but I know we had a great time.
•Harmon Killebrew Night at the old Metropolitan Stadium outside of Minneapolis while Connie and I were on our honeymoon. What better way to start a marriage than with a baseball game?
•Countless games at old Bush Stadium in Indianapolis, watching the Indians when they were a farm club for the Big Red Machine. The crowds were so small that the vendors knew you on sight, and the players could hear your individual voice when you yelled words of encouragement from the stands.
•A Reds game during the final season of Crosley Field that my brother and I attended together. It was memorable not just because we saw the game together, but because a Reds promotional event went hilariously wrong. Tennis balls tossed into the stands for a contest soon made their way back onto the field after an umpire’s questionable call.
•A Reds game in the nosebleed seats of Riverfront Stadium that Connie and I saw with a couple of great teacher friends from Ohio, and another game in somewhat better seats when a pigeon decided to make a sizeable deposit on the shoulder of my windbreaker.
•So many Fort Wayne Wizards and TinCaps games with our daughters that I lost count a long, long time ago.
•And a trip to Great American Ballpark a couple of years ago for Connie’s birthday. I don’t remember much about the game, but all the fans around us noticed that the opposing team’s manager had his fly undone. It was particularly embarrassing when he walked back from the mound after talking to his pitcher.
So the itch to create new memories is upon me.
That’s why I’ve booked us a few nights in the Indiana Dunes later this spring. The plan is to take the South Shore Railroad into Chicago and catch a Cubs game at Wrigley. Connie’s never seen a game there, and I figure after putting up with me