I’m not sure what we were thinking, but Dan and I decided to take Aidan to his first Cardinals game yesterday. Well, it wasn’t actually a whole game, but we did take him to Bush Stadium for the last 4 innings or so. Honestly, it was good we weren’t there long – he wouldn’t have made it. The look on his face when we entered the stadium was utterly priceless though. He was amazed by all the people and all the commotion. He was having a blast before we even got to our seats – mostly because of all the escalators we got to ride. That’s one of his favorite things to do. He likes to ride up and down and up and down the escalators at the mall. Honestly, he would probably be content to do that all day.
As soon as we got to our seats, he was looking around, flinging his head back and forth to look at all the people. And his favorite word, “wow,” was used – oh, maybe 1,000 times. He enjoyed watching the Cards beat the Braves, rolling in the peanut shells on the ground, lifting his seat up and down 500 times, and looking at all the “Nardinals” (as Aidan says) around the stadium. The girl in front of us had one on her hat, and Aidan kept trying to touch it. I don’t think she minded; she seemed quite amused with him. The boy behind us, who was probably about 10 or so, had a ball and glove, and once the boy heard a million “wows” from Aidan, he let him hold his baseball. Aidan can actually say baseball pretty well, and the boy was very impressed!
After our few innings of baseball, and watching the Cards topple the dumb Braves, we went to stand in a line of a million people because it was “Run the Bases Day” at Bush. The line didn’t even move for at least 45 minutes, maybe longer. Then the poor guy got really thirsty, so I sent Dan out on an unknowingly impossible mission – to find water. The game was over, so all the concession stands were closed. He ended up going into the main store where he bought a $20 coffee mug just to fill it up with water from the drinking fountain. Um, yeah – don’t even ask. We better have that mug for the rest of our lives…I asked him why didn’t he just come back and take Aidan to the drinking fountain. He said he didn’t think of that.
Then the line finally began to move, we got down onto the field, and what is Aidan’s favorite thing? Rocks. Yup, rocks. Not the view of the stadium, not the kids running around like monkeys, not Fredbird (although he was pretty interested in him). The rocks were what fascinated him most. Dan could barely get the kid around the bases, he had to end up carrying him part of the way. And Aidan is the type of child who doesn’t know how to walk – he runs 24/7. No slowing down for him. But on this day, during his first experience at a Major League Baseball game, our child wants to play in the dirt. Why on earth would he want to run the bases? What were we thinking?
Was it exhausting, sure. But overall, we had an amazing day. Not because the Cards won or because of the beautiful weather, it was because we were able to watch our son discover something new about the world. And that’s what it’s really all about.
Enjoy our photos of the day. (They were all with a crappy point-and-shoot, in case you were wondering!)
