Ask Ty...January 23 [The Ken Griffey, Jr. Question]

It must be Tuesday Friday, Middlespace Cadets, because I'm answering your questions

Q: Dear Ty,

I read that Ken Griffey, Jr. doesn't have a job yet. How am I going to know that it's Springtime if Ken Griffey, Jr. doesn't get a season-ending injury in late April?

Sincerely,

Seasonally Challenged American

Ty: Good question and an even better observation, Cadet SCA (hereby dubbed Cadet "Ska Child"). Oh, for the want of spring....

The robins sing, the air smells acrid with mulch and hope, pearlescent skin and hibernating body parts magically reappear, daffodils push through the crusty earth, and Ken Griffey, Jr. goes down for the season. Again. Ah yes, Ken "OFS" Griffey, Jr., the Vernal equinox personified. At least his wrist, elbow, knee, hamstring, foot, and abdomen traditionally usher in each spring; harbingers in specificity.

Bats left, throws right, he's Kenny "The Kid" Griffey, Jr. formerly of the Seattle Mariners, the Cincinnati Reds, and the Chicago White Sox and currently sitting on 611 home runs. Twenty year Major League Baseball veteran. Born into baseball and lives baseball - a lifer. Say what you want about his injuries, haters, but I was still in college in Santa Cruz when he was a rookie and I'm a fucking old man now.

Granted, he has been on vacation in rehab for most of his career. Junior is basically a used car with low mileage but has been subjected to several wrecks that you know of. You hope it's finally repaired but you just can't trust it anymore. You might use it for weekend grocery runs but you wouldn't want to commute in it or go for a cross-country road trip. Given a choice, you wouldn't use that car to take a woman in labor to the hospital at 3:00 a.m. You would really question whether you'd want to buy that car. And thus, KGJ is unemployed like the rest of us real Americans. The bonds of trust have been violated by muscle, tendon, and fate.

So what if KGJ doesn't get signed this season? I believe he will definitely find a place to play with baseballs this coming season, but what if, hypothetically, he doesn't? How will we all know if it is spring in the northern hemisphere? Then what? We will have to look for other signs of spring, won't we? "Whaaaahh! We don't know when it's spring because Ken Griffey, Jr. isn't playing baseball and getting so hurt anymore!"

Since I'm so goddamn altruistic, I present the following:

Ty Hardaway dot com® and Ask Ty...® presents - How to tell when it is springtime if Ken Griffey, Jr. doesn't have a baseball job and thus suffer a career-ending injury again

- If you live somewhere in or below some mountains, flooding may occur near your area during the springtime because of "snowmelt," many times exacerbated by warm rains. If it is flooding where you are it might actually be spring. Unfortunately, it could just be a broken pipe too. And if it's like November or July then it just couldn't possibly be the spring. Dunno.

But maybe you are Ken Griffey, Jr. and you are caulking the shower in your trailer and you slip and fall. Maybe that "flooding" isn't water from above, but it is tears you are crying; a "flood" of tears because you just tore the major tendon that attaches your huge thigh muscles to your knee ("clean off") and it hurts so bad. Then, yeah, it has become the spring time.


- Many flowering plants bloom in spring, sometimes beginning even if snow is still on the ground (I know, huh?!). If you see flowers maybe it is the spring. Or maybe it is your birthday or maybe you have had some sort of emergency inter-abdominal surgery which could happen at any time of year exclusive of it being spring. Maybe your spouse was being a dick and is sorry. Flowers are a large, if not huge, business that services many occasions.

Yet, if you see some flowers maybe you are a post-surgical Ken Griffey, Jr. who tore an ACL when you accidentally fell off of a stepladder as you were dusting the drapes at your cousin's house. In that case it is most likely spring. See?


- What else happens? Oh this also happens in the springtime--I just read about it in the wiki so it has to be true: Nowruz happens on the first day of spring and the beginning of the Iranian year. As well as being a Zoroastrian holiday, it is also a holy day for adherents the Bahá'í Faith. Blah-blah-blah.

So if you see Ken Griffey, Jr. in a turban making that rapid, high-pitched, "blee-blee-blee-blee-blee-blee" sound with his tongue running around and blowing up buildings and airplanes "In the name of the savior," then it could be spring time. But if the terrorist Ken Griffey, Jr. is in some kind of sling, cast, wheelchair, or serious looking bandage then it is definitely the spring. Look closely for the signs.

Just a guess,

-ty

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