High Fives and Plastic Chairs
Go watch baseball in person
Spring is here. It’s time to stop looking at your phone and get in the car. Go to the ballpark. The Twins might lose. It doesn’t matter.
The stadium is better than your living room. Your couch is soft. It is also a trap. At the park, the chairs are hard plastic. They are narrow. After three innings, your back will be stiff. You have to stand up to let a guy with three cups of terrible beer (Miller Lite) pass by. This is good. You have to move. You have to navigate a crowd. It reminds you that you are part of a physical world.
We are conditioned to be entertained every second. It is a bug in our collective operating system. Between pitches, people pull out their phones. They scroll through nothing. Between innings, the Jumbotron flashes a QR code. They want you to scan it for ten cents off gas. They want you to upload a selfie for the big screen. It’s digital noise. It’s worthless and exhausting.
Ignore the screen. Grab a paper program. A program has weight. It has texture. It doesn’t update. It doesn’t have a notification bell. When you are done reading the stats, you slap it on your knee. You set it aside. You can’t scroll a piece of paper for six hours. It is finite. It is a real object you can hold.
The stadium smells like bratwurst and onions. It smells like cotton mini donuts. These are physical realities. You can’t download the sound of an organ or the crack of a bat. You can’t simulate a high-five from a stranger when the home team finally hits a double. You can’t replicate the taste of sunflower seeds or bubble gum on a 4K display.
If you don’t have an MLB team, find a town ball game. Find a minor league park with rusted metal bleachers. The baseball might be bad. The stats don’t matter. The point is the social event. Heckle the opposing outfielder. Go with your family. Go with your friends. Sneak in your own peanuts if the prices are a scam.
The digital world is a vacuum. The ballpark is loud and uncomfortable and bright. Go sit in a plastic chair and watch a lousy team lose with ten thousand other people. It’s the best way to spend an afternoon.