The Sounds of silence

I have never been a particularly knowledgeable or aware sports fan, but that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy taking in a game. I loved it when my nephew played college football for the University of North Alabama and I would ride down to Florence with my father to see him. Roar Lions!

I also enjoy, once a year, going to Nashville to see the Nashville Sounds AAA baseball team. Most years, this has been in the form of attending United Methodist night in August, with inexpensive seats way out on the foul line, with the youth group and others from First UMC Shelbyville.

I first started going to that annual game with the youth back when the sounds were at Greer Stadium. The experience became even more special when the Sounds moved to First Tennessee Park (now First Horizon Park, although it hasn’t seen any use yet under its new name). You see, First Tennessee Park is built on a similar footprint to the old Sulphur Dell minor league ballpark, which was at one point the oldest professional baseball stadium in the country.

My paternal grandfather, John Vernon Carney Sr., died when I was only five or six years old, so I just vaguely remember him. But in his prime, he was head of parcel post at the old downtown Nashville post office, the building which now houses the Frist Art Museum. He and his co-workers pulled a very early shift, getting packages sorted and onto…