Shea Stadium Daze
Sticking with my truth is stranger (and sometimes funnier) than fiction theme. If you are a parent in 2018, I want you to picture this. You put your son and a few of his friends on a train, so they can go to the ball game with no parental supervision. Seems OK…right. Now imagine those boys that you are putting on the train are 11 years old! The next thing you know DYFS would be knocking out your door, they would take you away in cuffs, and you’d lose custody of your children. So I’m exaggerating…a little…but in 1971 that was my friends and me.
People talk about what they remember from their youth. The cost of milk or a newspaper, playing on the streets until way past sunset, how much easier things were way back when. I remember the Baker Hill Boys going to Shea Stadium without our parents, and it makes me sad that those daze are long gone.
I grew up in Great Neck, on the train line to Shea. With $10 in my pocket, I would buy my train ticket and board the LIRR. 15 minutes later, it’s off the train, across the bridge that connects to the stadium.$1.50 for a general admission seat, usually somewhere high up on the left field line (pretty much like the picture above). Get a scorecard, a couple of hot dogs, a soda, and enjoy the day. All for $10…you read that right…$10. And on the really good day, it was a doubleheader. None of this split doubleheader bull shit baseball has now. First game at 1:05 PM, 2nd game 2o minutes after the conclusion of the 1st. By the time you got home, it was dark.
So when people talk about how much milk cost, that there were only 6 TV stations, that kids played outside not on their computers, yada yada yada…that’s all well and good. But it’s the freedom that we had growing up back in the good old daze (stated with just a hint of sarcasm) that I think kids today and for the past 20 or 30 years have really missed out on. With that said, I’m going back to the TV to see if there is anything on the 400 channels my cable company currently offers….including Mets baseball.
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