C H A P T E R 3
Frankie
I kept buggin’ my friend Frankie to get in shape because
this year was gonna be different, but like usual, Frankie
could never take anything seriously. “I am friggin’ in
shape,” he’d always say. Frankie was my best friend,
although sometimes I didn’t like to admit it. I used to bug
him to go with me to the batting cages, but he always had
an excuse. Frankie was one of those people who always
had an excuse. But he was such a likeable guy that I could
never really get mad at him. Everybody basically liked
him because he acted like such a dimwit. I was probably
the only person alive who really knew that down deep,
Frankie wasn’t a dimwit.
He had kind of a tough year last year on our freshman
baseball team. He was the fourth-string right fielder. Now,
everybody knew that being fourth-string anything wasn’t
exactly something to be proud of, and in baseball, the
worst players were always stuck out in right field because
the ball wasn’t hit out there too often. So to be fourthstring
right fielder, well, that was pretty bad. But actually,
Frankie really wasn’t that bad of a fielder. The problem
was that he always managed to appear bad in the field.
One time in practice, Frankie missed eleven straight fly
balls—and when I say “missed,” I mean he didn’t even
get a glove on one of them. The problem was, Frankie
was wearing the wrong pair of eyeglasses. He had recently
had his glasses changed, but that day, for some reason, the
moron brought the wrong pair to practice, so he could
hardly see anything. Frankie was also injury prone. He
missed half of last season with a sprained finger that he
sustained while tying his shoe. Seriously. In the only game
he actually started, he was knocked unconscious in the
third inning when he ran into the football goalpost while
chasing a long foul fly ball. What a dimwit, right?
As far as hitting, well, statistics didn’t lie. Frankie was
up eight times freshman year, and the only time he got on
base was when he was hit by a pitch while trying to bunt.
The ball hit him right in the stomach, so he had to leave
the game. He sat on the bench for the rest of the game,
swaying back and forth and moaning. The seven other
times Frankie appeared at the plate, he struck out. He
did manage to hit three foul balls. It was sort of sad when
the players would sit around and talk about hitting, and
Frankie could mention only his three foul balls. But he
was still proud of them, even though two were on checked
swings. Despite all of that, Frankie always assured me he
was going out for the JV team this year, even though he’d
done nothing to improve himself in the off-season. I told
him he’d never make the team unless he worked out, and
his answer was “Don’t friggin’ worry. I’ll be fine.”
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The first time I met Frankie was in first grade. He
sat next to me, and for some reason, we both started
laughing. He might have said something, I might have
said something, or maybe it was just a stupid look or
something, but we both started laughing—and we
couldn’t stop. The teacher, Mrs. White, made us both
stay after school. The next day, it happened again, and we
both received the same punishment. When it happened
one more time, we had to go to the principal’s office.
Mr. Wagner, the principal, seemed to be sort of a nice
guy, but we were both scared to death. He talked to us
for a while in a stern voice, but then his mood got a little
less serious, and he cracked some dopey joke. Well, the
joke wasn’t too funny, but we both laughed a little to
kind of make Mr. Wagner feel good—and it worked. Mr.
Wagner laughed right along with us. Then I looked over
at Frankie, and we both kind of wondered what the heck
we were laughing about, so we started laughing along on
our own. Of course, once Frankie and I got to laughing
together, there was no way to stop us, so there we were
again, laughing our heads off uncontrollably, but ole Mr.
Wagner, who must have thought he was Bob Hope or
something, was as pleased as punch to think he was such
a good comedian.
“Okay. That’s enough, boys,” Mr. Wagner said. “Let’s
get back to Mrs. White’s class.”
Well, we couldn’t say anything because we were
laughing so uncontrollably, so we just nodded, and
Mr. Wagner took us back to Mrs. White’s class. By the
time we got back to class, we were laughing so hard our
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stomachs hurt. We waited at the door, and Mr. Wagner
advised Mrs. White that he’d had a long talk with us and
believed we would behave ourselves. Our stomachs were
hurting so much that we finally stopped laughing, but
Mr. Wagner tried the same dopey joke on Mrs. White.
Well, of course, she didn’t think it was funny at all, but we
broke out laughing again. That really pleased Mr. Wagner,
who apparently had forgotten that the reason we were
sent to him in the first place was because we were always
laughing. We walked back to our seats and continued
laughing throughout the rest of the morning. Mrs. White
made us stay after school for the rest of the week.
Eventually, we had to see the school psychologist.
The school psychologist was a fat, roly-poly old guy with
a red nose named Mr. O’Hirlihy. We were pretty scared
when we went to see him. He tried to act nice to make us
feel at ease, but he overdid it. Apparently, he didn’t know
the reason we were sent to him, so he cracked a joke.
It was really stupid and even worse than Mr. Wagner’s
jokes, but it was so bad that it got us laughing again, and
we spent most of the interview laughing away with Mr.
O’Hirlihy, who was trying to act like Soupy Sales. We
had a great time and went back to Mrs. White’s class in
better spirits than ever. She sentenced us to another week
of detention. We later found out that Mr. O’Hirlihy had
gotten us mixed up with some other screwed-up kids
he was supposed to interview who were suffering from
chronic depression. That was why he gave us the Soupy
Sales comedy routine. When we went back to him again,
we were pretty scared because we figured he was pissed
18 |
at the mistake he’d made, and we were afraid he might
try to pull a Boris Karloff Frankenstein routine instead of
a Soupy Sales routine. Well, he was totally serious, and
he didn’t crack any jokes, but with his red nose and bald
head, he didn’t much resemble Frankenstein.
We had to see Mr. O’Hirlihy once a week for about a
month, until somebody came up with the brilliant idea of
making Frankie sit on the side of the room opposite me.
That worked pretty well for Mrs. White’s class, but Mr.
O’Hirlihy was still curious about our laughing fits. One
day some lady from New York City came to interview us
and said that Columbia University wanted Frankie and
me for some child psychology experiment. She said she
wanted to study one of our laughing fits and take moving
pictures of us and everything. We were excited. We felt
like celebrities. My brother even predicted we’d wind
up on The Ed Sullivan Show. But our mothers wouldn’t
let us. It was bad enough that the local school system
thought we were nuts; our mothers didn’t want the whole
world to know. The lady psychologist tried to convince
our mothers that Frankie and I were special and that
perhaps we held the secret to what could make millions
of children throughout the world happy. She said it would
benefit the world if Frankie and I could be studied. Well,
our mothers thought that was a little far-fetched, and
Frankie’s father said he thought the lady psychologist was
a Communist, so they would never sign the release form
to allow us to be studied.
Once we were separated in class, our laughing kind
of died down, and eventually, everybody forgot about our
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laughing fits. Every year after that, Frankie and I would
always try to sit together at the start of the school year,
but after one week and several laughing fits, the teachers
would split us up. By the time we got to the fifth grade,
they were ready for us, and they would split us up on the
first day. Frankie still believed that was why he didn’t
get into the same section with me in high school. He
thought there was a conspiracy to keep us apart. Frankie
even got philosophical sometimes when we talked about
how they tried to split us up all the time just because
we liked to laugh so much. Frankie said the world was
basically a pretty sad place, especially for grown-ups, so
when grown-ups saw kids having a real good time and
laughing away, they got jealous and tried to stop it. I
wasn’t sure if Frankie was entirely right, but I thought his
theory had a lot on the ball. We never could quite figure
out why we laughed together so much, but we still had
some of that spark left when we got to high school, and I
didn’t want to lose it.
Good old Frankie was always my best buddy, and
regardless of the fact that he’d probably never make the
JV team, I wanted him to try. I kind of needed him.
He always built up my confidence, and I was going to
need it this year. I knew last year’s fun and games were
over. What a circus that season was. Our only win came
against a team with only eight players. Seven were secondstringers,
and one was the equipment boy. That happened
because the team’s bus carrying all the frontline players
broke down on the turnpike, and even so, that game was
really close. We won 7–5 when Dionne sliced a two-run
20 |
double into the trees down the right-field line. We did,
however, have a few decent excuses for our miserable
record freshman year. One was that our two best players
were playing JV. Another reason was that our coach was a
really nice guy but a terrible coach. He was actually just a
history teacher who, for whatever reason, decided to take
on the task of coaching the freshman baseball team—a
job that most of the big-deal, all-pro gym teachers who
thought they were great coaches didn’t want to touch. So
Mr. Gonzo took on the task.
Mr. Gonzo knew the Civil War inside out, but he
didn’t seem to know the difference between an inside
pitch and an outside pitch. He was the type of coach who
didn’t believe in stressing the fundamentals. Our pitchers
would practice intricate pick-off plays, even though they
didn’t know how to throw a strike. Our outfielders and
infielders would practice elaborate cutoff plays, even
though most of us had trouble catching the ball. We’d
work on squeeze plays, even though we couldn’t bunt, and
we’d practice hit-and-run plays, even though we couldn’t
hit a lick.
Despite the fact that we couldn’t hit, throw, or
catch, Mr. Gonzo set up an elaborate system of signs to
apparently make up for our flaws in the fundamentals. He
had signals for everything—take, swing, bunt, squeeze,
hit-and-run, steal, pitch-out. Of course, we didn’t get to
use the signs often because we didn’t know how to bunt,
hit, or pitch.
One of Mr. Gonzo’s favorite signs was the pitch-out.
As soon as an opponent’s runner got on base, which was
| 21
often, he’d flash the pitch-out sign to our pitcher and
catcher. Sure enough, the runner on first would take off,
trying to steal second. Mr. Gonzo felt real proud about
always knowing when to expect a steal and call for a
pitch-out. The trouble was, our catcher couldn’t reach
second base. It didn’t matter if there was a pitch-out
or not; there was no way our catcher was ever going to
throw out anybody trying to steal second. I thought the
other coaches were well aware of our catcher’s throwing
deficiency, and I was sure their strategy was simply “If you
get on base, run.” Anyway, Mr. Gonzo thought he was
positively crafty with his pitch-out sign.
Another one of Mr. Gonzo’s problems was that
he didn’t know how to conduct a practice. He was a
great believer in delegating authority. He’d delegate the
responsibility of hitting fly balls to one of the secondstringers
so that the starting outfielders could get some
fielding practice. The trouble was, the guy he sent to hit
the fly balls could hardly swing the bat, so the outfielders
would stand out there for a half hour while the guy
would hit weak pop-ups or anemic little grounders. It
was nothing like what happened in a real game.
Then Mr. Gonzo would set up batting practice. He
wouldn’t let our two best pitchers—and calling them the
best wasn’t saying much—pitch batting practice because
he wanted to save their arms for real games, so he was left
Mr. Gonzo knew the Civil War inside out, but he
didn’t seem to know the difference between an inside
pitch and an outside pitch. He was the type of coach who
didn’t believe in stressing the fundamentals. Our pitchers
would practice intricate pick-off plays, even though they
didn’t know how to throw a strike. Our outfielders and
infielders would practice elaborate cutoff plays, even
though most of us had trouble catching the ball. We’d
work on squeeze plays, even though we couldn’t bunt, and
we’d practice hit-and-run plays, even though we couldn’t
hit a lick.
Despite the fact that we couldn’t hit, throw, or
catch, Mr. Gonzo set up an elaborate system of signs to
apparently make up for our flaws in the fundamentals. He
had signals for everything—take, swing, bunt, squeeze,
hit-and-run, steal, pitch-out. Of course, we didn’t get to
use the signs often because we didn’t know how to bunt,
hit, or pitch.
One of Mr. Gonzo’s favorite signs was the pitch-out.
As soon as an opponent’s runner got on base, which was
often, he’d flash the pitch-out sign to our pitcher and
catcher. Sure enough, the runner on first would take off,
trying to steal second. Mr. Gonzo felt real proud about
always knowing when to expect a steal and call for a
pitch-out. The trouble was, our catcher couldn’t reach
second base. It didn’t matter if there was a pitch-out
or not; there was no way our catcher was ever going to
throw out anybody trying to steal second. I thought the
other coaches were well aware of our catcher’s throwing
deficiency, and I was sure their strategy was simply “If you
get on base, run.” Anyway, Mr. Gonzo thought he was
positively crafty with his pitch-out sign.
