APRIL 20, 2019 – I am at my family’s “retreat” by Grindstone Lake in northwest Wisconsin. Through woods to the west, the next dwelling is hidden from sight. To the east lies undisturbed family-owned acreage acquired by my grandparents in 1939, when dirt was dirt cheap, and on which they built a cozy cabin—at the far end—in 1940.
What I like best here is observing nature close up. Over decades I’ve learned to see it all as baseball: slow, often still, punctuated by a “pitch,” a “hit,” or a “play,” ever so swift, it’s missed if the eyes aren’t trained at exactly the right place at the right time.
For example, I’m sitting on the dock, reading (snoozing?) on a lazy summer Saturday afternoon. I (awake and) look up just as a bald eagle lands a stand-up double atop a pine down the shore.
Or . . . while standing on the lake ice at sunrise on a winter weekend, I see a distant fox with icy breath in the sub-zero cold, stealing back to shore.
Or . . . I watch a fisherman reeling in for the umpteenth time with nothing to show for his boredom. Out of nowhere, “the big one” strikes. As he lifts the fish out of the water, I see it’s a home run.
Or . . . I contemplate he biggest white pine in front of our place—the one that was an undistinguished rookie at the time of my earliest memories of this grand “ballpark.” Now swaying majestically in the winds off the lake, that stalwart tree has become a hall-of-famer.
Or . . . Late on a Friday night after the three-hour drive from “the cities,” I step out of the car into pitch blackness. An otherworldly light draws my gaze skyward. Through the opening in the trees, I see ALL STARS—billions beaming brightly.
Just as in baseball no two moments here are the same, whether from behind the plate (in the bow of the canoe heading toward shore), just above the third base dugout (the screen porch facing the eastern woods), or in the right field bleachers (on the path deep in those woods). As baseball is all about statistics, so does my view of nature here comprise infinite combinations and permutations: seasonal change, variation of weather, rising and declining angle of sunlight, and continuous interaction of incalculable numbers of creatures and organisms up and down the food chain.
One can point to the spectacular of spectator sports—the Super Bowl, the final match at Wimbledon, the final game for the Stanley Cup—just as one can highlight the grand phenomena of nature—Mt. Everest, the Grand Canyon, Whitehaven Beach. But if for the most dedicated fan there is no sport quite like baseball, for me, there is no place quite like here where I now write, where I have observed more of nature’s pitches, hits, and plays than of its staggering beauty elsewhere.
© 2019 Eric Nilsson
