So me and Allen, perhaps stoned, perhaps just stupid, found an aluminum bat and in lieu of a ball spent an hour pitching rocks to each other and smacking them into a corn field in Arroyo Grande. Amazing how far a rock will travel off an aluminum bat. There were a lot of strikes, a lot of pop flies, a few homers, and a few that went straight as a cannon shot towards the pitcher. Neither of us were hit, and we kept at it till my wife came out and asked what the fuck we were doing. Playing baseball, Allen said. With rocks. Well stop it right now, she said. We stopped. Let’s see, that was the late eighties. Allen was in his twenties. I’d passed thirty a couple years before. We were bored and the corn field before us stretched for acres. It made sense at the time. Not so much now.