Sarah with her 2020 softball team
Probably the best memory of sports is when I began to play softball with older guys when I was still in high school. The guy in front left is John Armenta from Buena Park. All the other guys were local, except for Gilbert who was from Artesia, top row second from right. He married a gal I went to school with. And John married Linda who was from a family that was close to ours. This team is the Aztecas and is how I met him for the fist time. John liked the way I could play outfield and hit. So every now and then he would call me and invite me to play with him on teams that were representing local bars, nothing to do with the team we played on from our Lakewood softball league. I found that at the time bar owners would gather their own team of mercenaries and then would challenge another bar to a game. The bar owners would put money on a bet against one another. And the team that won the game would go to the bar and get free grub and beer. So I became a mercenary as a teenager playing with John and a bunch of guys I never met before. But I didn’t care, I just liked playing ball and now this type of game was for keeps and everyone played really hard. I wound up getting to know of few of the other players as John was the one to pick who he wanted on his team since he was the pitcher and he was the ace. But hanging out with older guys had its advantages, I would get to go to the bar as the winning team and got to drink beer at the bar even though I was still a teenager. That was a blast playing this type of softball with John and the other guys.
