Midmorning the sky is a deep and cloudless blue, straight out of a dream; a new, high-pressure breeze is blowing cool but still short-sleeve September weather from the north. And today, thanks to a little foresight and a lot of luck, we have tickets to the actual Field of Dreams–the bleachers, where the sun shines brightest, and the crowd is better than most of the games. In fact, we have three more tickets than we can use. But the game’s long been sold out, and there will be no problem getting out money back, even enough extra to pay the baby-sitter. Bleachers can easily go for $20 or $30–anyone who’s been around the park knows that. It’s not as if I’ll be taking money from the homeless, or unfair advantage of anyone. I’ll only be trying in my own small way to improve my lot the slightest bit, by taking to heart and following the principles set out by our last two presidents: I don’t expect the government or anyone else to take care of me; I’m doing it myself, by my own ingenuity and enterprise. Pursuing the American Dream.
I lower the price to 20.
They turn and walk down the street.
I suppose I’ve replayed those last two scenes in my head a hundred times. I replayed them while walking between the two burly cops (why are cops always “burly,” if not downright “fat”?) who grabbed my arms and flashed a badge in front of me; and again while staring at the change and keys and wallet and slips of paper I’d empty from my pockets onto a station-house table; and while trying to remember the phone number of a friend who might be home on a beautiful Sunday afternoon and be willing to come to the station with money to bail me out; and while staring at the patch of blue sky glowing through the barred window just below the ceiling, beyond the cell where I sat . . .
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Two of them, one in front and one behind, walk me the three blocks to the station. All five feet, four inches, and 135 dangerous pounds of me, carefully guarded by two cops who must be at least three times my size. I can understand their care. After all, I’ve heard Sylvester Stallone isn’t more than three or four inches taller than me. And I was thrown in jail once for an illegal left turn when I had an out-of-state license 20 years ago. And I was photographed by the FBI at an illegal demonstration with Rennie Davis outside McGaw Hall in 1970. In fact, as late as last year I knowingly ran a stoplight. They keep a close watch. They know how to handle the dangerous. And at each step of the arrest, the casual degradation whose practice the cops have mastered inspires a kind of pure rage:
And what about the ticket brokers who buy huge blocks of the best seats and resell them at prices far out of the means of the poor “average fan”? Aren’t they the ones the cops are really protecting? Along, of course, with the poor Tribune Company.
