The beginning of baseball must mean that spring is really here

The Byrds once sang that to everything, there is a season. Well, the season for baseball is fast approaching. With the start of the Major League Baseball season coinciding with our return from Spring Break, it is truly beginning to seem like spring.

It's about time for America to have something to shout about. After the drain of impeachment, Americans are ready for something serene and pristine. The beauty of the grass, the symmetry of the lines, the smell of a well-oiled mitt: these are the things we love about baseball.

Mythic figures like Abner Doubleday, Babe Ruth and Joe DiMaggio give us the chance to think about the positives in America rather than the negatives.

Memories from the historic season of 1998 are still with us. Mark McGwire's pointing to the sky after hitting No. 62, Sammy Sosa's kissing salute to the cameras after yet another homerun and David Wells' complete elation at pitching a perfect game are just as fresh in our minds as they were prevalent on SportsCenter all summer last year.

This coming season will offer a whole new round of intriguing questions. Will McGwire hit 71? Will the Red Sox make it to the post season without Mo Vaughn? Will Roger Clemens win the Cy Young award as (gasp) a New York Yankee?

While these questions will be the ones pressing us as the summer comes and goes, there are other, more immediate reasons baseball is coming at just the right time. Soon enough, we will be able to forget our midterm grade in History 1653, "Baseball and American Society, 1840-Present" by, of course, going to a game at Fenway.