Moths, Fog, Bubbles and Baseball

It's the tail-end of a long day. Got three solid hours of work done this morning, went to the gym, then came home to bake a cake (birthday celebration for two of the people in my writing workshop tomorrow). At 5:30, with SG and Spouse in tow, I took off for SBC Park to go to a ballgame...with the inevitable logistical catch: we had bought parking in advance, so I was taking the Girl and The Dad to the park to pick up the parking ticket and give it to me; then they went and got pizza while I went all the way across town to pick Younger Girl up from the camp bus. Immediately--like, within two minutes of leaving the house--things began to go awry: we left the tickets for the game at home and had to turn around and get them. Still, even with traffic, we got to the park, and with only the usual amount of brain-dead stress, I got the parking ticket from Spouse and turned the car toward Pacific Heights, where the bus comes. Of course, every idiot with a pulse (not to mention the drunks and crack addicts and bus drivers) were out in force: my favorite was the scrawny woman (a drug addict, I'm pretty certain) who got out of the passenger's side of her car at a stoplight, kept the door wide open while she turned in circles like a dog beating down the tall grass, drooling and cackling. Finally the driver of the car got her back in and, after the light had gone from red to green to red again, got the car door closed so that I could squeak by and make my turn.

I got to the bus stop five minutes late; fortunately the camp bus was nine minutes late, so it all worked. Drove back to SBC Park, parked in the exorbitantly expensive parking lot, and, carrying extra jackets and a blanket and two umbrellas, started toward the park. We were delighted to find that they ran shuttles from the lot to the Park, so we got there only ten minutes after the game started. By the time hotdogs and soda had been procured, we were into the second inning. The Cardinals did some brilliant fielding tonight, and the Giants--with momentary exceptions--were not at their best. But the park...Oh, the park.

I realize I'm not always appreciative of My New City, but I have to say, SBC Park is great. And tonight it was particularly charming, because we had fog. I realize I have been downright surly about fog, but that's fog around my own personal home, and seeping into my bones. Tonight, even before the sun had set, fog settled around the ballpark, blurring the skies and the water of the cove, so that it seemed like we were looking out at a distance lined with gray cotton batting. We were sitting high up in the right field, which gave us a wind break and meant we stayed warm, relatively speaking. And as the night went on the fog rolled in over the top of the stadium and down over the field in soft, billowing clouds. The stadium lights made the fog glitter slightly; moths flitting through the fog glowed like gigantic fireflies. Then some enterprising child started blowing bubbles on the level below us, and the glittering foggy night was suddenly dotted with shimmering flocks of bubbles, moths, and the odd seagull.

The Giants lost, but it was a very pretty night.