“Winning is an Attitude” It’s all about enjoying a challenge and
stretching oneself to the limits. It is absolutely essential
that you develop mental toughness. Mentally tough people can think
negatively without becoming discouraged. The issue is not failure
but your reaction to it. Enjoy your work, your work is important. Go
out with a plan and stick to it. If you miss, accept it. Your next
opportunity is more important than your last mistake. Stop reacting
to your failures and start developing the right mental attitude, “I
Am a Winner!”
Robert Royal Beauchemin (1923-2004)
Born in Houston during the spring of 1967, I was the son of an avid
Astros fan. My father, Robert Royal Beauchemin, was born in Michigan
on Halloween day, 1924. He was raised a Detroit Tigers fan. Every
summer in the early 1930s, his father would send him to his
grandparent's house in Canada so they could babysit. There he would
listen to the games through a transistor radio. When he began high
school, he would always hand write the plays on homemade scorecards.
The next day, he would relive the games through his writings. By the
time he was a senior in high school, he could type the games action
live as they played out over the radio. In the fall of 1941, he was
accepted into one of the most prestigious literature universities in
the country at the time, Boston College. By then, he had already
written a baseball novel of sorts. Since his 18th birthday was on
Halloween, 1941, it meant the destruction at Pearl Harbor was only 8
days after. He tried to quit college that December to join the Navy
but the elders at the university wouldn’t let him. He was persistent
on quitting so they arranged a way he could still serve our country,
while not risking his life daily. He was assigned to the Navy
baseball team and played centerfield from 1942 through 1945. His
pictures are on the wall in Arlington, Virginia at the Pentagon.
When the war ended, he married my mother and they both agreed
Michigan was just too cold so they packed up the kids and went as
far south as they could. They landed in a little town called
Harlingen, Texas. When my father heard Houston was getting a
baseball franchise a few years later, he gathered the kids again,
“Hello Houston!” Sitting in the stands for the first Colt 45s game,
my dad fell in love with the city and the team. He then raised his 9
kids to be the same. We became Astros Buddies during the mid-'70s
and Bob Watson would even call our home occasionally to discuss
potential player pickups and trades. My dad knew baseball. He wrote
Bob letters a lot and that’s what started their relationship. He
took his kids on road trips every summer following the team until he
died of cancer in 2004. On September 26th, 2012, my hopes for the
Astros were bleak. We had set records for the most team losses for 3
consecutive years. But, as I awoke the next morning on the 27th,
there was news the Astros had hired a new manager. Later that same
day, a newscaster mentioned the new manager's wife was from Houston.
Within 15 minutes, “Havin’ a Ball” was complete. It was a gift for
her because being from Houston, I knew she would do a lot of extra
stuff in and around the community.
Peter James Beauchemin |