Waiting 38 years to relive a memory

As a kid I was a Pittsburgh Pirates fan. When the team beat the Baltimore Orioles in the 1971 World Series, I was the happiest kid in my central Illinois neighborhood.
But since nobody else in my part of Illinois followed the Pirates, I didn’t have anybody with which to share that happiness. So on that sunny October day in 1971 in Illinois, with the satisfaction that my team had just captured the world championship, I was reduced to walking through my neighborhood, Pirates baseball cap proudly on my head, hootin’ and hollarin’ to nobody in particular while sporting a big, stupid ear-to-ear grin.
Reflecting back on that special time in my life, my guess is that the neighbors probably wondered what the goofy Morsch kid was up to now.
Flash ahead 38 years later to Saturday night at Otto’s Brauhaus in Horsham, where I found myself sitting across the table from one Jackie Hernandez, who was a guest of the Philadelphia Athletics Historical Society based in Hatboro. I am honored to be a board member of that non-profit organization.
Jackie Hernandez was the shortstop for the 1971 World Champion Pittsburgh Pirates. The Cuban-born, light-hitting anchor of the middle of the Pirates’ defense was a teammate of my favorite players, Hall of Famers Roberto Clemente, Willie Stargell and Bill Mazeroski.
I had the opportunity to ask him about that world championship team and about my boyhood heroes. He was their teammate, he knew what they were like as players and individuals. He was there when the last out was recorded and was celebrating with his teammates at the very same time I was walking down the street in my neighborhood in Illinois, looking for somebody with which to share my own personal celebration.
Jackie Hernandez was had a front-row seat to one of my fondest boyhood memories. And I got to sit at a restaurant in Horsham Saturday night and listen to his version of my story.
How cool is that?