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MR. MET
There is something automatically fascinating about a living creature with a face
that doesn’t change. Mr. Met has had a big baseball head for over 40 years, and he
has had the same smile and the same unnerving, unblinking eyes. Mr. Met looks as
if he always feels the same thing about you, and about everyone he meets. He is as
happy to see adults who turn away from him as he is to see children who run to him.
He is as happy to dance with Greeks as to dance with Pakistanis. Everything
pleases him and nothing fazes him. He does not speak, but he loves to dance. He
reminds me of the Laughing Buddha you see in Chinese gift stores. He may not
have a big belly, but he has a very big head. And his perfect happiness makes you
wonder if he will bring luck.
Mr. Met is the right host for the ballpark because he makes you feel goofy. He
convinces you that an undiscriminating silliness is a precious state of being. He
follows the people who shoot the t-shirts into the crowd and yes! you want a t-shirt.
When he dances on the dugouts, you bounce your head from side to side. He is
happy when the Mets do well and you are happy when the Mets do well. He raises
his arms and you cheer.
He doesn’t seem to be around when the Mets screw up. Where does he go? Do
they hide him? What’s the story with this? Is there a policy that requires him to stay
in the clubhouse when things aren’t going well? Is he in there? Smiling, happy,
surrounded by glum and foul-mouthed players? That would be something to see.
How does he make the players feel? Maybe he actually stays on the field but you
just don’t notice him.
You forget that someone is inside, someone who probably doesn’t have that
smile on his face. You forget that someone is paid to dance and to manage the big
bobbly head. You don’t think of Mr. Met as a guy in a suit. He seems real. He is as
real as anything else at the stadium.
I see a part of myself in Mr. Met. I see a part that I need in order to be a
baseball fan. I see the part that doesn’t get upset, that keeps coming back for more
and more, that is happy with everything he sees at the park from the moment he
comes in to the moment he leaves. I see the part that lives with the lousy trades and
bad decisions and disappointments and never once thinks of rooting for a different
team. The part that stays happy as I wait in the line to leave the big lot through the
space in the fence that puts you out on the road with the little shack shops that sell
parts for cars and hubcaps.
©Dana Brand 2006
