Hello. I'm a law student in Williamsburg, Virginia. You can find out more about me, if you'd like; or, enjoy the rest of the site.

Autographs

Posted: November 14th, 2005 | Author: Mark Pike | Filed under: Stuff |

We used to leave the house with an Audobon book, a backpack, and binoculars. My Dad and I would set out in his blue Peugeot to see how many birds we could spot in an afternoon. Seagulls were easy enough. Crows. Mergansers! Pileated woodpeckers. And of course, great blue herons. Sometimes we’d watch from behind the windshield so we could talk and not spook the birds. Sometimes we’d get out and hike around the suburban ponds and glorified sewer ditches. I would make hash marks in a notebook, keeping count of something that I was never quite sure of. But, it just made sense to keep track.

My baseball card collection was taking off too. We went to NYC to see the Yankees play in 1987. I finally got to see Don Mattingly play. I learned to read by announcing the Yankees box score at the breakfast table.

For my bar mitzvah, my Dad arranged for a close family friend to get me a signed baseball by the best living Yankees. Mickey Mantle is on the sweet spot. Yogi Berra is on there. Hank Bauer. Whitey Ford. I used to sleep with it by my bed, in case there was a fire and I needed to leave in a hurry.

We went to Spring Training a few times to collect autographs too. Wade Boggs. Deion $anders (he actually signed my card with a dollar sign for the “S”). Ruben Sierra. The Don Mattingly signature was elusive. I sent him a picture of me with my monument to Mattingly, a collection of every piece of Mattingly memorobilia I owned with a handwritten request for an autograph. The picture was pretty creepy, in retrospect.

My Dad was in Hawaii with my Mom for a conference earlier this month. They were sitting at a table in the bar, when they noticed Yankee Captain Derek Jeter sitting at the table next to them. Jeter’s girlfriend had her feet up in his lap and they were having a great time. My Dad wanted to respect his privacy, but he also wanted that autograph for the collection. This is what he did…

He left a pre-postaged self-addressed postcard with a hotel employee and a note that said something along the lines of: “I’ve been a Yankees fan for over 50 years… I didn’t want to disrupt you in the bar… Thanks for the memories. Look forward to seeing you in the Series again next year.”

It arrived in the mail today.

12 Comments on “Autographs”

  1. 1 Anonymous said at 11:53 pm on November 14th, 2005:

    I LOVE YOUR BLOG…. I LOVE YOUR STYLE OF WRITING….MOSTLY I LOVE YOU!

  2. 2 themarkpike said at 12:05 am on November 15th, 2005:

    THANKS! MOM?

  3. 3 nat the dem said at 10:10 am on November 15th, 2005:

    That’s the coolest thing I’ve ever heard.

    Okay, maybe not.

    But it’s definitely in the Top 10.

  4. 4 Mona said at 10:35 am on November 15th, 2005:

    See now that’s why you don’t allow anonymous posts.

    Of course, usually on mine, my friends are absent mindedly talking amongst one another.

    Also, the gummi bears don’t have lactose. let me clarify, they have a preservative - ok yes, I’m bad, I forget the name - that I can’t digest. It also comes in most jams, all carbonated drinks, and a slew of other things. Props to peanuts tho!

    But feel free to continue eating the awesome things. Actually, I’ve recently discovered the sugar-free kind are doable - weird how that is.

    Also, I noticed some yogourts and cheeses I can handle.

    This is a very random thing to post. Sorry about that.

    Way to have an anonymous post though - you’re one step away from Jude Law status.

  5. 5 themarkpike said at 12:23 am on November 16th, 2005:

    Top 10! Sweet.

    And seriously, I’m guessing that was my Mom who posted earlier.
    Keep it clean around here folks. It’s a family friendly blog…

  6. 6 Pandorasfoxx said at 7:04 am on November 16th, 2005:

    I googled you to find your blog today…it was the first thing to come up when I googled “mark pike”…so I guess you made it to number one?

  7. 7 themarkpike said at 2:59 pm on November 16th, 2005:

    This is the best news I’ve heard in a very long time. Today is a great day. I’m even wearing news pants today. It’s a very festive atmosphere.

  8. 8 themarkpike said at 10:59 pm on November 16th, 2005:

    correction:
    I’m wearing “new pants” today. Not “news pants”. Thanks, Mom, for pointing that out.

  9. 9 erin said at 8:56 am on November 17th, 2005:

    But what if they WERE “news pants”? What would that mean? Would they be pants made out of newspaper, fit for only a one-time use?

    The only anonymous comments I ever get are mean ones correcting my grammar and passive-aggressively belittling me. I’m jealous.

  10. 10 Anonymous said at 2:50 am on December 5th, 2005:

    Dear Mark,
    I would really love to see the picture that you sent Mattingly, of you surrounded by his memorabilia. Could you post this (or just email me, but I do think the general public would benefit from viewing it)?

    Sincerely,
    Sintana Vergara

  11. 11 themarkpike said at 3:03 pm on December 5th, 2005:

    I’ll see if it can be located… though I might reserve the right to lock it into a safe forever.

  12. 12 TheMarkPike » Blog Archive » On the Move said at 9:00 pm on August 1st, 2006:

    [...] For those of you who follow this site regularly, or know me as a real human being, this should come as no surprise. For those of you who stumbled upon the site while searching Google for “Derek Jeter’s Girlfriend“, well, thanks for swinging by. Same goes for those of you who got here off the Proptopia website, and could you please let me know why I’m getting tons of traffic from a message board that focuses on rebuilding movie props (”prop till you drop”)? [...]

Leave a Reply