For One More Day

“My father once told me, ‘You can be a mama’s boy or a daddy’s boy. But you can’t be both.’” 

With these words, Chick indicates the depth of his attachment to his father, and the root of the pain that that relationship causes him over the course of his life. Because the story is told in retrospect, it’s important to remember that the frequent comments Chick makes about his own actions come from the perspective of someone who has already lived through the events in question. With that in mind, this is one example of a narrative strategy frequently used by the author - a general statement followed by a narrative example from Chick’s past.

“It took a few seconds to find my voice, as if I were remembering instructions on how to do it. How do you talk to the dead? Is there another set of words? A secret code?” 

This quote comes from Chapter 8, when Chick is sitting at the kitchen table in his childhood home, being fed scrambled eggs by his mother, who has been dead for ten years. He is on the verge of an important decision - to suspend belief and to enjoy the chance to spend one more day with her, something he has longed to do in the years since her death.

“...now you know how badly someone wanted you, Charley. Children forget that sometimes. They think of themselves as a burden instead of a wish granted.” 

Chick’s mother is a source of comfort to him throughout their day together. At first, she is evasive when he asks her where she came from, and tries to explain the turns his life has taken, but this is the first of many times when she indirectly addresses the pain at the roots of Chick’s crisis. Here, she is telling him how she tried for a long time after her marriage to conceive a child, and even carved a prayer into a tree. By referring to his birth, she directs his attention to the very beginning of his life and encourages him to reach back in his memory to reevaluate his life.

“And you know the weird thing? Somehow, I knew all this the moment I looked her in the eye. Not the details, of course. But lost is lost, and I knew that look because I’d worn it myself. I hated her for having it. I hated her for being as weak as I was.” 

Here, Chick describes being picked up by his mother on the day she is fired from her job. Though his mother always tries to put on a brave face for her children, it is clear to Chick that something is wrong. This quote shows the close nature of Chick and his mother’s relationship, as well as the dynamic that often disrupts it: because Chick identifies with her, it is easy for his inner turmoil to warp his view of her.

“‘Remember, Charley. Sometimes, kids want you to hurt the way they hurt.’” 

Chick’s mother says this as she is doing Rose’s hair. It can be analyzed in combination with the previous quote: it shows that Chick’s mother was aware of the pain that motivated her son’s cruel behavior toward her, and for that reason she is gently accepting and forgiving of it. She is also perhaps subtly addressing the adult Chick’s pain over being left out of his own daughter’s wedding.

“I used to dream about finding my father. I dreamed he moved to the next town over, and one day I would ride my bike to his house and knock on his door and he would tell me it was all just a big mistake. And the two of us would ride home together, me on the front, my dad pedaling hard behind, and my mother would run out the door and burst into happy tears.” 

Chick is describing a daydream that he would frequently have in the time shortly after his father left their family. He envisions a reunion where not only does his father return to their family, but all relationships in the family are healed: his father explains to him directly that nothing is really wrong, and his mother’s tears show that she bears no hard feelings toward his father. The detail of his father carrying him home on his bicycle can be understood metaphorically as a craving for his father’s support.

“A boy can always see his father on a baseball field. In my mind, it was just a matter of time before he showed up for real.” 

Chick summarizes one facet of his adolescence in his distinctive voice. It illustrates how, for him, the baseball field served as a symbol of his hope that his father might one day return. It also hints at the importance of ghosts, and more specifically the recurring theme of ghosts becoming real.

“He nodded at me. Everything seemed to freeze. Eight years. Eight whole years. I felt my lip tremble. I remember a voice in my head saying, Don’t you dare, Chick. Don’t you cry, you bastard, don’t cry.” 

In this moment, Chick realizes that his father is sitting in the stands at his first college baseball game. The moment is an incredibly important one for Chick, and he is overwhelmed with emotion to the point of tears. It shows the paradoxical nature of his father’s enduring influence on him: as important as his father is to him, it is equally important that he not betray that fact in the moment, and instead remain stoical, to avoid disappointing him.

“Instead, I do what he asks me to do, I seek permission to skip the bus ride home. He is respecting the authority of my coach, I am respecting the authority of my father, and this is how the world makes sense, all of us behaving like men.” 

After his father witnesses Chick play well in several games, he approaches him and offers him a ride home. This quote illustrates both the momentousness of the occasion for Chick, who feels that he has earned his father’s attention with his good performance, and also the regret of the older Chick, who looks back on this moment with dismay. Here, he recognizes his father’s role in modeling appropriate male behavior, as well as the absurdity of these codes of behavior in the face of the years of pain and confusion his father’s actions have caused.

“I stood on the dugout steps and watched the Baltimore players run onto the field and celebrate, throwing themselves into a giant pile by the pitcher’s mound. To others they looked ecstatic, but to me they looked relieved, like the pressure was finally off.” 

This quote contains an important insight into the way Chick views baseball, and especially his time in the major leagues. Though he believes that he is fulfilling his dream, he shows here that he also feels oppressed by the intense external pressure to impress his father. Chick does not feel full ownership over his own dream, and this is the cause of his ambivalence.

“They call a short stay in baseball ‘a cup of coffee,’ and that’s what I had, but it was a cup of coffee at the best table in the best joint in town. Which, of course, was good and bad.” 

This passage, part of Chick’s description of his brief stint in the major leagues, shows his distinctive narrative voice - his frequent use of metaphors drawn from everyday life, and his belief that his experience says something meaningful about life in general.

“I was more alive in those six weeks with the Pirates than I ever felt before or since. The spotlight had made me feel immortal. I missed the huge, carpeted locker room. I missed walking through airports with my teammates, feeling the eyes of the fans as we passed. I missed the crowds in those big stadiums, the flashbulbs, the roaring cheers—the majesty of the whole thing. I missed it bitterly. So did my father. We shared a thirst to return; unspoken, undeniable.” 

Here, Chick describes attaining his dream of playing in the major leagues. However, he describes the whole experience from a time when it was already over - he is not describing the feeling of walking through airports and seeing fans, for example, but instead he is remembering missing those moments. This quote sums up the glory Chick felt he had attained during this period, and also the strength of the memory itself. Chick believes that the memory of those six weeks motivated him to stay in baseball for longer than he would have otherwise and made the other careers he tried afterward seem dull, by comparison.

“It’s funny. I met a man once who did a lot of mountain climbing. I asked him which was harder, ascending or descending? He said without a doubt descending, because ascending, you were so focused on reaching the top, you avoided mistakes.

‘The backside of a mountain is a fight against human nature,’ he said. ‘You have to care as much about yourself on the way down as you did on the way up.’

I could spend a lot of time talking about my life after baseball. But that pretty much says it.”

This quote shows the importance of metaphor in For One More Day. Here, as in many other instances, the metaphors are overtly introduced in Chick’s voice, rather than being woven into the text unannounced. Here, a career is compared to a mountain, and reaching the peak is the best one can hope for.

“‘You can find something truly important in a minute.’” 

When all the glass in Thelma’s house explodes, Chick is reminded that the day he is spending with his mother is ending quickly, and he asks her anxiously how much more time they have. She remains calm, and reminds him that the most important thing is to use the time you do have as best you can.

“You count the hours you could have spent with your mother. It’s a lifetime in itself.” 

This quote highlights the importance of time in the book. Time structures the book’s narrative - it takes place over a single day, and its sections are divided by times of the day. Time is also mysterious - Chick is able to go through the events of his whole life in a day with his mother. Some of his mother’s enigmatic statements refer to this, and she tries to teach him to value of the time he does have, rather than mourning the time and opportunities he has lost. In the course of one full day spent with his mother, he learns the value of time well spent.

“‘Life goes quickly, doesn’t it, Charley?’

‘Yeah,’ I mumbled.

‘It’s such a shame to waste time. We always think we have so much of it.’

I thought about the days I had handed over to a bottle. The nights I couldn’t remember. The mornings I slept through. All that time spent running from myself.” 

Chick’s mother gently gives him a lesson on the importance of spending time well. This quote comes from Chapter 23, when Chick’s mother is explaining why she did not choose to remarry. She tells him that her children, grandchildren, and friends were enough for her, and also perhaps implying that, though she values her children, the time she spent being married to someone who could not return her love was not as fulfilling as what came after. Chick’s reflections here highlight the deceptive nature of time in the book - the time that he wished would pass slowly seemed as infinite as this one day that he has with his mother is brief.

“I have spoken enough about how bleak my life felt after baseball. I should mention that Maria was the exception to all that. [...] I would later learn, after I fell out of her life, that she wrote about sports for her college newspaper. And in that mixing of words and athletics, I realized how your mother and father pass through you to your children, like it or not.” 

This quote refers to Chick’s life after the major leagues. Though he was unable to halt his life’s spiraling out of control for the sake of his daughter, he reflects on the joy that she brought him as a child and teenager. Chick was able to share his love of baseball with his daughter, instilling in her a love of the game without putting pressure on her. His newfound joy in his family is magnified when he sees how his and his parents’ passions are shared by his daughter.

“Her clock radio was playing big band music. Her pillows had been freshly plumped. And her body was crumpled like a broken doll on the floor of her bedroom, where she had come looking for her new red glasses and collapsed. A massive heart attack. She was taking her last breaths.” 

Here, Chick evocatively describes a scene he did not witness: his mother’s death. Not the mention of big band music, which his mother loved and which has symbolized family love at other points in the book. It’s also important to note that the book’s final revelation, that Maria is its narrator, sheds additional light on this scene: a teenage Maria was the first person to find her grandmother, after she had her heart attack, and Chick regrets that she had to face the death of her grandmother alone. The details in this scene hint both at Maria’s first-hand experience and Chick’s wish that he had been there to protect his daughter and say goodbye to his mother.

“I hope you never hear those words. Your mom. She died. They are different than other words. They are too big to fit in your ears. They belong to some strange, heavy, powerful language that pounds away at the side of your head, a wrecking ball coming at you again and again, until finally, the words crack a hole large enough to fit inside your brain. And in so doing, they split you apart.” 

Some of the book’s most powerful metaphors have to do with the relationship between mother and child. Here, Chick uses two metaphors: Catherine’s words telling him that his mother has died represent the death of his mother itself, and the metaphor of a wrecking ball, describing the devastating effect of this news.

“I lost both parents on the same day, one to shame, one to shadow.” 

This quote, from Chapter 26, refers to Chick’s intuition that he will not see his father again after he is disappointed by Chick’s behavior at the Old Timers’ game. On this day, his long-held belief that he could only please one parent comes to its natural but disastrous conclusion - in trying to please his father, he has missed the chance to say goodbye to his mother.

“‘You have one family, Charley. For good or bad. You have one family. You can’t trade them in. You can’t lie to them. You can’t run two at once, substituting back and forth. Sticking with your family makes it a family.’” 

In Chapter 28, Chick’s mother explains the reasons behind her divorce: his father’s second family. His mother mentions several times the importance of loyalty and commitment to maintaining a family, and here she echoes the advice from the letter she gave him on his wedding day: that in order to have a successful marriage, you have to value the marriage as much as your spouse. Here, the statement can be interpreted both as a reaction to his father’s actions and advice to Chick as a husband, father, and son.

“...from that point on, it was hard for me to face my daughter or my wife. I think that’s why I drank so much. I think that’s why I whimpered off into another life, because deep down I didn’t feel that I deserved the old one anymore. I ran away. In that manner, I suppose, my father and I were sadly parallel.” 

This quote, from Chapter 28, captures Chick’s newfound capacity for reflection. Instead of feeling sorry for himself about the effect his actions have had on his family, he is able to calmly take responsibility for them because he understands the root causes of his behavior. The sense of connection and continuity with his family both provides him with joy and helps him understand how his past has influenced his present.

“My mother shook her head. ‘A child should never have to choose.’” 

When Chick and his mother visit his father’s other wife, Chick recalls his father’s insistence that he had to choose one parent to be loyal to. In light of the revelations about his father’s other family, Chick realizes that, given the choice of one parent, he should have chosen his mother. His mother replies here by asserting that his father’s idea of parental love is flawed - he offered Chick conditional love, given only when Chick was able to earn his approval. Earlier in the book, Chick sees his mother’s love as flawed in that it is not conditional. He believes that, because he doesn’t have to work for it, he values it less. In this moment, Chick’s mother shows him the beauty and value of unconditional love.