What Happens When A Sissy Joins the Gay Softball Team?

I was a big sissy when I was a kid. I was thin, meek, and a runt. I would rather practice the violin in my bedroom than play football at the park with the other boys in the neighborhood. In retrospect, of course, I now know just how badly I wanted some of those boys in the park to tackle me, and that it was the fear and horror and excitement of those forbidden desires that kept me in the security of my bedroom.

But my father would have none of this seclusion in my safety zone. Like anyone else with eyes and ears, he noticed that I was a big sissy, and he wasn’t pleased. One childhood summer, he decided that I would play Little League baseball because it would, in his words, "toughen me up a little."

I was mortified. I had never had a mitt on my hand, and though my father was insisting I be more manly, it wasn’t like he ever took me out to the park and played catch.

So I arrived at Little League in my ill-fitting uniform, self-consciously aware of just how unprepared I was to play.

It was as big of a disaster as I feared. The other boys teased me that I "threw like a girl." When I ran, it was even funnier. At bat, I almost always struck out. And one time out in right field, I was so nervous as a fly ball headed toward my outstretched glove, that the anxiousness and anticipation caused me to pee in my pants.

There seemed little sport or fun in Little League, either. I still remember with a shudder all those paunch-bellied, red-faced fathers with veins popping out of their foreheads as they yelled obscenities at the umpires. And every time I’d mess up—which was just about every time I went on the field—one of the other boys would mutter "fag."

So it was with this history that I signed up for the gay softball league.

Friends familiar with my dismal track record have wondered out loud if I am seeking cheap therapy for my childhood trauma by donning a baseball cap and glove as a homosexual adult—some sort of "owning the oppression" psychobabble.

But the reason I joined the gay softball league is simpler.

Newly single after a seven-year relationship ended, I found myself frequenting the gay bars just a bit more than I liked. I’m not much of a drinker, so I wasn’t worried about drowning a broken heart in a bottle of booze. And I understand and respect the important role that gay bars have played historically, and continue to play in many areas, as a place of shelter for the community.

But I could see that I was falling into that trap that so many gay men do: Depending too heavily on the bar for the preponderance of my social life. That’s when I decided to join the team. I wanted a way to meet and socialize with other gay men without the overt sexual atmosphere and maximum cruise component inherent in bars.

The first day I showed up for a gay softball game, my stomach was churning the same way it did 30 years ago at Little League. The other guys on the team were wearing cleats and jerseys with the team’s logo on it, and those tight gray baseball pants that hug your body and show off your butt. I had on a T-shirt, a pair of oversized shorts and sneakers. I felt like I wanted to go in my room and play the violin.

Instead, I went out to center field, like the butch manager of the team told me to. It wasn’t long before a fly ball headed my way. I stood there with my glove up in the air, trying to appear as if I was focused and intent on catching the ball. But the truth is, I was just concentrating on not peeing my pants.

I did catch that ball. To my astonishment, other miracles happened, too. I didn’t strike out at bat. No one laughed at the way I run. And it didn’t matter that I still throw like a girl.

Of course, there are still some guys on the team who call me "sissy" and "fag." And I look forward to it every week.