[OLS]

To work in the heat and the dirt and to keep on going when they can never cheer a win
is hard, especially on them. On you it just makes you wonder if you can coach, lol.
But the best thing might actually BE that you only had 12. If there had been too many,
there might be kids from the same neighborhood that had to go to other teams, and it
could be harder to see their friends who might have had more success. They might have
had that smeared in their faces. I continue to believe that they are a mirror that reflects you.
As long as you say the right things, their mindset should stay on a good overall path and
they can feel some sparse fruit from all that hard labor. When you have an orange
tree that puts out three oranges while your neighbor's puts out bag after bag, YOUR
oranges are sweeter to you just for the fact that you were able to watch those three
blooms grow into green nubs then into big green orbs and then oranges, and you had to
give some thought to when you would eat each one, and each one was special.

What I would like to see is if they all show up for the same hard work next year,
and hopefully even more. What you had BEST with 12, is that they all got to play
a good amount of time, and even if they lost every game, they all lost together.
No one had to ride the pine and think, I am not even good enough to get in the
game and we're losing. Lose every game next year, who cares, if they all get to play,
believe me, they will all be on to other things soon enough. you made their baseball a
combined effort by every kid you had. You are lucky to have had that luxury.
Allow yourself the pride you deserve in mentoring kids in a world of parents that think
that that is X-Box's job.