Share your thoughts about this essay and what it's
about.  See what others have said.

Guestbook









    



             INSIDE BOB MURPHY’S VOICE

       Everything is fair and safe and well-intentioned.  The bases are firmly
anchored and the weather is perfect.  People have funny stories to tell about
each other.  

      I am happy in the back seat of a car on a dark road because Joe
Christopher is coming to the plate.  It is early March, but spring is here.  I
know whether the ball that has just left the bat will leave the park, and if I
don’t know, then it will be very close and very exciting.

      I might have been lonely on a long drive, but I’m not, because an old
friend is with me.  An uncle, really.  Except not as much of a pain in the ass as
my real uncles.

      I know it is good to be a parent, a husband, and a friend.  I doubt that
those who do bad things really mean to do them.  I am glad when the Mets
win, but I have sympathy for the misfortunes of others.

      Young kids are eager and veterans are wise.  The young kids will become
veterans.  The veterans will retire, but they won’t die for a long time, and you
will still run into them from time to time.

      Everyone has something interesting to say.  Every bad thing that
happens can be borne.  I am awake and full of hope.

      Afternoons are pleasant in prospect.  Nights are evenings.  They are to
be enjoyed.  It is never morning, but somehow it always seems to be.

      It is 2 A.M. in my dark upstairs bedroom and it is the twentieth inning
and neither the Mets nor the Astros have scored a run.  One summer in my
thirties, almost all the recaps are happy.  A man I have known all my life dies
when I am almost fifty and I never wrote him the letter I always meant to
write him, telling him how much he meant to me.

      Inside Bob Murphy’s voice, I am glad to be on the earth.  And I am one
of the nicest guys you could ever hope to meet.  


©Dana Brand 2006