The Best Gift Ever

The mitt. That famous mitt. The baseball mitt Joey always used to wear. He wore it on his left hand. The mitt came from Matthew Arnold for Joeys tenth birthday. Matthew Arnold was Joey’s favourite writer. He would write Matthew Arnold letters telling him how much he looked up to him. In one of Joey’s letters he wrote to Matthew Arnold, he told him about his love for baseball. He added that his birthday was coming up and was going to celebrate it on the field. I guess when Matthew Arnold read his letter he decided to send Joey a brand new mitt so he could play with it on his birthday. It was Joey’s favourite present from his tenth birthday.

He cherished his mitt more than anything he owned. He kept it in his bottom drawer. He would lock it every night to make sure that it was safe. He would always use it while he was on the field. Joey kept it to himself. He never lent it to anyone, except me. I never used it because I’m not that much of a sports player. I don’t really enjoy playing sports. I never would play with Joey, I would always watch. Now I regret never wanting to play with him. I regret it a whole lot. I will never have another opportunity to play a match with him because he’s dead.

Joey died from leukemia when he was in Maine. He was only eleven years old on July 18, 1946, the day he died. It was tragic. It was terrifying to see my best friend go. To see such an intelligent, nice person disappear so young. Disappear into nowhere at all. Disappear forever. I was two years older than him, but that didn’t change the fact the he was fifty times more intelligent than I. He was so intelligent that his teachers even wrote letters to our mother telling her what a pleasure it was having him if their class. I feel terrible now that my mom doesn’t get anymore letters from a teacher telling her how smart her sons are. I wish my teachers would send my mother letters telling her how smart I am, but they don’t. Instead they probably send her letters telling her how bad I’m doing. So bad that I’m flunking.

Joey’s mitt is a dark color, sort of blackish. It has strips of leather on the outside and a soft cozy material on the inside. It is quite comfortable I have to admit. It is stiff, but a good support for my hand. The hand I hurt the night Joey died, the night I slept in the garage and broke the window with my fist. It still hurts. Joey wrote poems from Matthew Arnold in green ink all over the fingers, pockets and everywhere. He wrote them so that he’d have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up to bat. I found it very smart. It was amazing that he never wasted any minute of his life, the short one that he had.
I would like to share with you one of my favourite poems that Joey wrote on his mitt. It is quite long. I never got how Joey always could fit so many words onto something the size of his mitt. It was incredible. He was incredible. I love him.

“I miss you. I miss your happiness, your way of being. I miss your perspective on life. You had everything I always wanted, everything most people wish they had. You had a happy, loving personality. You never got mad at me, well at anyone. You were the person I looked up to. I miss you”. Those are the words I tell him every night, wishing he would be listening. Listening to how wonderful he was when I had him around. How he will always be remembered by everyone.