Time will tell if yesterday was a great day or simply a very good one. There is one fact that will always remain and that is that home is always home. People like to say that home is where the heart is, but don’t we leave a piece of our heart behind in every place we’ve ever lived?
It started like any other travel day. Driving to the Sheetz off of Pole Green Rd just outside Richmond. Then on north to 95. Right around lunch time is when we hit to traffic in PWC and my daughter said she wanted buffalo wings. She wanted Dirty Buffalo but as we ain’t in Norfolk that ain’t doable so I started heading to Buffalo Wing Factory on Rt 50 in Fairfax. To do that I got my ass off 95 and surprised myself by finding my way to Silverbrook Rd and eventually 123. By then our mind had changed and we were heading to Ledo’s pizza so my kids could learn that their pizzas are square because they never cut corners.
It was too early as we pulled through Burke and into Springfield and a slight detour was in order. That is when we pulled into Hidden Pond Nature Center where they’d built a nice new playground. That was a big hit with the kids as was the corn snake, and other reptiles in the nature center. Ledo’s Pizza was also a surprising hit and also another link in my chain of cost of living is really cheaper in Northern Virginia when you take out housing. $17 v $70 to feed the five of us.
Then it was time for our main event. Nats Park. I really am surprised that no industrious person has started charging for parking at the old HH lot. The team abandoned it and abandoned it remains, but free is free and $45 saved is $45 earned.
As for the ballgame it was a baseball game. The kids complained about being bored in the middle innings. I had a downright delicious lager from a place called Freedom Brew. Straight up amazing. I said for years that if craft breweries stopped putzing around with twenty billion IPAs they could make something truly amazing and they have. The Ben’s chili dog hit the spot more than I expected and when the Nats rallied in the tenth Windsor was cheering his heart out chanting let’s go Nats, and as Dylan Crews’ bases loaded single sailed passed the diving Marlins second baseman I enjoyed seeing his happiness more than mine.
To think I spent a lot of time in the 300 section of Nats Park with my own father. The opening of the ballpark, Strasburg’s debut, many Zimmerman walk-offs, and the first ever playoff game. It is a special place with lots of special memories, and even if we now live much further away I am hoping that yesterday was the start of a new generation of memories.
David Huzzard Writes 