Douglas Witmer
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
more personal baseball history
Over the holiday weekend I finally found these photos. Here are the 1983 Warwick Phillies from Lititz, Pennsylvania. As you can see we had extremely realistic Philadelphia Phillies powder blue road uniforms (save for a few details). I wish I had a photo of the back of these uniforms. The nameplates all said "Warwick."
The Warwick Phillies were the "travelling team" for the 11-12 year-old age level which was called Midget-Midget. The travelling team was chosen by try-outs, versus just signing up and being able to play on one of the in-town teams. We travelled all over Lancaster County to play other teams, and also competed in several tournaments each season, the main one being the New Era tournament, which was played in Mount Joy at Kunkle Field, a terrific little league ball field with sunken dugouts, lights, a warning track, advertisements on the outfield fence, you name it.
The team is pictured here, not on our home field behind the Wilbur chocolate factory, but on a non-descript field outside of town, where we often practiced, called the "Clair Brothers" field. You can see the Clair Brothers patches on our sleeves. Clair Brothers was an audio equipment firm that did big concert events and I think that's their building in the background of the team photo.
The day these uniforms were handed out was kind of a dream. It happened after practice at the Clair Brothers field. I can't remember if uniforms were handed out in turn by name or if we all kind of lunged for them. I remember it as a mix of both. There was tension in the air because of competition over who would wear certain numbers: 20 (Mike Schmidt), 14 (Pete Rose), 10 (Larry Bowa), 34 (Gary Matthews), and, of course, 32 (Steve Carlton, my hero). I watched anxiously as several boys tried on number 32. In the end, it only fit the smallest boy on the team.
That boy was me.
Labels: baseball, my favorite things, Phillies
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Sunday, September 23, 2007
the last day of summer
Some of you know that my job is being the co-owner of The Green Line Cafe, located a few doors down the street from where I live. In late August, I found myself with a small open period of time between exhibits I had scheduled for the cafe. So I decided to fill it by hanging a few of my pieces there. It was the first time I displayed my own work at the cafe. It wasn't really a show. Just a place for a few of my paintings to be for a time. Work like mine is often displayed in fairly pristine environs. So it was good to see these paintings existing in a heavily trafficked public space, in the mix of a lot of other visual information, music, conversation, activity. To me they felt "domesticated"...what I wish for them...to be in relationship to places where people (not viewers) live.
One of the things I was particularly interested in seeing was the paintings with the stained glass windows in the space. When we renovated the cafe space just over five years ago, we restored the uppper set of windows, adding color. I chose and arranged the colors. You might say these windows have become another one of my favorite things. The ideas of transparency and clarity have been prominent in my color and they probably come in part from looking at the light coming through these windows.
Something about taking this work down on Friday afternoon, in the golden light of late September, I felt the summer end for me.
Labels: Green Line Cafe, miscellany, my favorite things, my work, paintings
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Friday, September 14, 2007
my favorite things
Kicking off a new occasional series of images documenting some of my favorite things...not merely things I'm enthused about, like this website, for instance. But, rather,my favorite things. The stuff in my possession that I cherish.
I suppose this first one could also be an extension of "personal baseball history."
Labels: baseball, my favorite things
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