Although, this was a new Cardinal stadium (not the Bush Stadium of my youth), I could still recall as I looked onto the Gateway Arch on the Mississippi from the entrance to the great baseball park that Dad—just as we kids had observed in our childhood.
We had come to St. Louis games quite often here in the early 1970s —including a match of soccer between the St. Louis NASL team and Pele’s New York Cosmos.
The baseball game this past August night was very good for the home crowd—with the Cardinals winning handily over their ancient rivals, the Dodgers.
That night, I saw several homeruns, including a grand slam homerun by the Cardinal star, Albert Pujols.
I had to then recall that when I attended my first major league baseball game in 1970 in Chicago with Dad, we had observed numerous homeruns, including a grand slam.
Actually, that ChiSox game was the first time Dad had ever seen a grand slam homerun and he marveled at my luck for years, saying, “I had been to 25 major league baseball games and had never seen a grand slam, but the first time Kevin goes, he sees a grand slam! I can’t believe it!”
FOURTH STOPI got up early the next morning at my hotel on Continental Drive in Wentzville and made one last journey to St. Louis.
Along the way, I stopped in a Barnes & Nobel Bookstore and bought a book by David Maraniss, entitled CLEMENTE: THE PASSION AND GRACE OF BASEBALL’S LAST HERO.
I then passed through St. Louis, by the Arch, past the baseball stadium I had visited the night before, and finally drove to the Illinois side in order to be in the state where Dad was born in 1934—i.e. the same year when Roberto Clemente was born. I ended up first on land owned by Monsanto and couldn’t get through to the Mississippi there or at the train tracks.
One Illinois trainman warned me at Cahokia, Illinois about trying to cross the tracks there—even after I had explained to him what I was trying to do. The stated sternly, “There are a lot of ‘railroad wackos’ with guns out back that way. You had better try from the Missouri side—possibly near the Arch.”
To make a long story short, the trainman convinced me to go back over the Mississippi River and disperse the last few ashes of Dad there.
Sometime later, on my way back towards the Gateway Arch, I began to cross one of the bridges over the Mississippi River. Suddenly, I saw that I had room to maneuver safely, and a sudden sense of strength and calmness passed over me.
Quickly, I rolled down my right-hand car window as I approached the middle of the river and tossed the tiny brick of marble out towards the water—easily clearing the bridge’s railings at the edge of the far right lane.
Then I smiled and headed back to Wentzville, Missouri for lunch—a hamburger and Peanut Buster Parfait at the new Dairy Queen situated across from the St. Patrick’s Church I had visited the day before.
Why did I end my pilgrimage by eating a Peanut Buster Parfait?
Well, Dad (Ronald John Stoda) loved peanuts. As a matter of fact, at we children’s we had concluded our memorial for Dad a few weeks earlier by serving peanut butter pie, peanuts, and Reese’s Peanut Butter cups.
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