On Sunday, we lost the first game against the Sons of the Palisades, an aging group of ballplayers whom I despise collectively but like individually. They've been together a long time. They perform well under pressure. They're arrogant. As individuals with their jocks off, though, they're almost uniformly good guys.

We were winning the second game 8-3. They were down to their last at-bat. They quickly loaded the bases. By the time there were two outs, the tying run was at first base and their best hitter, the crafty and powerful Mike Flaherty, was at the plate. Flaherty is one of those guys who people say once played semipro ball, whatever that is, and you believe them. He's big now, but quick and graceful. Easy going, but intense. A natural-born athlete. As the left fielder, I'd been able to track down most of his shots so far that day. One was a line drive hit straight over my head. It was still rising as I backpedaled, but I was able to grab it. Another was a pop-up in the no-man's land between shortstop and deep left field, where I usually position myself against Flaherty. I was able to catch it by sliding on my left hip and shoving the glove under the ball like a spatula under a fried egg. I remember a relatively lazy but long fly ball to left center, too.

With the game on the line, I again played him deep, and cautioned the left center fielder to move back also. If he puts it over our heads, the winning run (Flaherty) is in scoring position, I said. Flaherty worked the count. It occurred to me that he might be looking for a pitch he could take to right, as he had another time that day, to advance the runner on first to third. Then he swung and lofted another fly between me and shortstop Jimmy Pezzuto, a guy I've been playing ball with since we were freshmen at Manhattan Prep. He ran back. Jason Roif, a bear of a man playing left center, charged it. I took off with my eyes glued to the ball as if it were a mouse and I were a raptor.

I sensed that Pezzuto, Roif and I were converging, but that I was the only one of us who had a chance of fielding the ball cleanly. Diving for the ball, in fact, is my favorite play, something I've become known for doing. I pushed off the turf like a swimmer on the blocks with my mitt in front of me. The ball plopped in. I held it aloft for the umpires to see, jumped up, and turned around to see Jimmy behind me, where his momentum had carried him, in left field. His arms were extended like an Italian grandfather's. We embraced.

"There was no fucking way I was going to let those bastards take another game from us in their last at bat," I said.

Softball is one of the ways I get high nowadays. Racquetball is another; so is my Wednesday night poker game, or Saturday mornings on the Rowley's Bridge Trail. As bad as the reality of the past week might have been, I'm usually able to shut it out for a while and focus on nothing but what I'm doing. Bluffing a good hand. Serving an ace. Pretending I'm Hideki Matsui or the kid I no longer am in left field.

Nothing else matters at these moments. I'm at one with what I'm doing, with who I am. That was always the illusion that drink and drugs held out, but there was always a hangover — physical and emotional.

We shook hands with the Sons, as is the custom. When we were done, one of the Sons asked if I had a minute to talk.

"Sure," I said. I assumed it would be about the Hastings Parents Network (the online discussion group we moderated). He had been a member for a long time, sometimes posting something that addressed an issue in a novel way.

"Does the name Jason Tyler mean anything to you?" he asked.

I shut my eyes, shuddered, and took a deep breath.

"It means a lot to me, why?"

My friend said that he'd been hanging around with his daughter and her friends, all of whom were a lot younger than Jason.

"Yeah, that's Jason," I said. "Jason was the guy who taught Carrick how to shoot up" I said.