EDITOR’S NOTE: This is a sponsored post on behalf of Warner Bros. Pictures’ and their new film The House in theaters June 30.
It feels like just yesterday that I was chasing fly balls back and forth across the outfield of my childhood baseball diamond. Anyone that grew up with me, knew that I was a horrible hitter and there’s no denying the fact that any base-knocks I recorded with the Lions in the 1986 season were a direct result of me squinching my eyes shut and trusting that a higher power would help me not embarrass myself in front of any girls in the stands.
I was better in the field, though…or maybe not…but at least I hustled. That’s what all the coaches used to say…”Damn, Kulpy sure can hustle”, as a pop fly torched over my head and I fell backwards, quickly jumped up and hopped on my horse in an all-out frenzy to catch up with it before it hit the outfield fence and the runner scored.
I was a hustler.
Whatever skills I didn’t possess ON the field, I tried to make up for OFF the field. Or at least that’s how I remember it. Every year, the big fundraiser would go down. We’d each get our allotment of candy bars and the deadline on when to have our money in. After covering our nut, the remainder of the funds would go towards purchasing new equipment for the team. And this is where I would shine like a diamond.
I’d head home that night and start to beat the street, which isn’t easy when you live in the country. It required strong legs to pedal halfway across the county to hit a dozen houses, prepared to outrun German Shepherds and keep my fingers crossed that no farmers would pull the double-barrel shotgun on me.
And when I started coming up short, it was my parents whose animal instincts to help their children kicked in. My dad would toss a few bars into his Igloo work cooler and on lunch break use his seniority around the construction site to force the younger bricklayers to cough up a few bucks. Mom would set up shop in the back of our family station wagon in the hospital parking lot after her night shift, peddling chocolate like a street vendor outside of Veteran’s Stadium.
And if we still had anything left, she’d hit up the family phone tree which was taped to the wall by the telephone and guilt our extended family into getting out their checkbooks.
They stopped at nothing to make sure that I strutted into that dugout on Saturday morning with a rubber-banded roll of singles in my glove.
The same can be said for Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler in their new comedy ‘The House’, which hits the theaters on June 30th.
The two play Scott and Kate Johansen, who lose their daughter Alex’s college fund and become desperate to earn it back so she can pursue her dream of attending a university. With the help of their neighbor Frank (Jason Mantzoukas), they decide to start an illegal casino in his house…
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is a sponsored post on behalf of Warner Bros. Pictures’ and their new film The House in theaters on June 30th.