Sacrifices

Sacrifice. It has many meanings and many purposes. One could say that from a religious point of view that it’s a killing of a victim on an altar. In another sense of terms it means destruction or surrender of something for the sake of something else. Another meaning is something given up or lost as for example the sacrifices made by parents. In baseball a sacrifice fly is a batted ball that satisfies four criteria:

* There are fewer than two outs when the ball is hit.
* The ball is hit to the outfield.
* The batter is out because an outfielder or an infielder running in the outfield catches the ball (or would have been out if not for an error).
* A runner who is already on base scores on the play.

It is called a "sacrifice" fly because the batter presumably intends to cause a teammate to score a run, while sacrificing their own ability to do so. Eddie Murray (128), Cal Ripken Jr (127), Robin Yount (123), Hank Aaron (121), and Frank Thomas (121) are the current leaders for most sacrifice flies of all time.

But the kind of sacrifices I’m referring to are one the ones being made every day. White collar and blue collar folks are all making sacrifices on daily basis for their families. A family of four where the husband was a successful business man and now has been unemployed for the last two years because of a failing economy and so the Business he worked for had to “downsize” and as a result he was let go by the business. No severance package and no benefits are given to him for all his hard work and years of dedicated service to the business. Everyday he’s filling out numerous applications and yet no return phone calls or only short interviews that leave him with the dreaded words spoken, “we’ll be in touch”.
What about the hundreds of military servicemen and servicewomen who have paid with their lives to establish freedom and justice in Iraq or other foreign countries? Many have sacrificed their lives so others could have freedom.

What about the police in our country who everyday is fighting a never ending war on crime and drugs?

What about the single mother that holds down two jobs so both of her children can have the things that they need for school and in life in general such as food on the table and clothes on their backs and shoes on their feet? The mother lets go of her own desires and makes sure that her children needs are always met before her own needs and desires are met.

When it comes to sports cards or your sports collection could you make the sacrifice if you needed to? Could you give up something you owned and collected for years so it could help to meet the needs of others or the needs of your own family? In order to meet the needs of my copay for Highmark Blue Cross I ended up having to sell my autographed Adam Lind collection (which Marie from A Cardboard Problem knows and saw the guy who bought my cards-talk about a small world) and a few other things I’ve collected over the years from my personal collection. I did not have a $1,000.00 in banking to meet our deductible and with two kids that kind of leaves me with limited funds 99.9% of the time so I began liquidating my sports card collection and we ended up selling our PS3 that we got for Christmas. It was a gift from my Aunt Pam to me (she said I should have some fun with toys too) and I hated to sell it and it didn’t help seeing my son crying about it but I explained to him it was something that I had to do in order to meet the finances. He cried for a little while but told me it was okay and that he understood. Later that night he was still upset though and it burned a hole in me to have to do it but I had no other choice. The way I see it…. If it’s going to let me pay the copay and give me some extra money to get them both some well needed new shorts and pants for my growing son and growing daughter (they’re both having growth spurts at the same time……argggghh) and a few pairs of shoes for them both then so be it. It’s not easy and it is difficult at times but we get by and I see to it that they have what they need. I’m still hoping to perhaps somehow over the next couple of months find a way to get another PS3 to replace the one we sold as we all miss it dearly. However that just depends upon what’s left after getting our envoy 4 new tires that are badly needed. Just can’t win sometimes.