Arvid Huisman.

As a 10-year-old boy, I enjoyed major league baseball. Sitting on the living room floor in front of the massive console television with a small, snowy 17-inch picture, I watched the baseball greats of the day — Mantle, Berra, Musial, Aaron, Banks, Maris and Williams.

Who were those lucky people in the stands, I wondered, who got to see the action in person? I could only dream of such things.

Somewhere between then and adulthood, I lost interest in baseball. Even though the idea of attending a major league game still popped up occasionally, I never followed through.

Then, along came a son who, at a tender age, became a baseball fanatic. He collected baseball cards and knew each player by name, team, position and current stats. He honed his math skills by calculating earned run averages. And, he began begging to attend a major league baseball game.

Finally, in 1982 when he was nearly 10, we went to a Kansas City Royals game with some friends and the family became hooked.

On summer vacations, we tried to work in a major league baseball game. Over the years, we attended games at Chicago’s Wrigley Stadium as well as ballparks in Kansas City, Minneapolis, St. Louis and Milwaukee. A friend in Kansas City had access to season tickets so we saw the Royals on numerous occasions.

While I’m no longer a big baseball fan, I have always enjoyed the ambience of a major league park. From fanatical fans to crazy vendors, a ballgame is always fun.

A Brewers-Tigers game at the old County Stadium in Milwaukee was most memorable.

Shortly after the game began, a 40-something guy sat down in front of us, plopping a large grocery bag into an empty adjacent seat. He pulled out a thick, hardcover book and a bag of peanuts and began devouring both.

Why, I wondered, would someone pay a major league ticket price to eat peanuts and read a book amidst all that noise. I never got a chance to ask, because a few minutes later someone told him he was sitting in the wrong seat and he left.

Toward the end of the game, a middle-aged man took an empty seat across the aisle from me.

As fans began leaving the stadium, he grabbed the wrists of women as they passed and, in a very gentle manner, kissed their hands. The women appeared shocked but did nothing, other than the few who pulled their hands away. I was waiting for a militant feminist to come along and break his lips.

When my son was a college student, he had planned to go to Kansas City with a Sioux City friend to take in a couple of baseball games, as well as a round or two of golf. His friend had a traffic accident on the way to our home and the Kansas City trip had to be scratched.

Seeing his disappointment, I took some time off from work and we headed south to Kansas City. It was a weekday and I felt confident we could get good seats at the last minute. In fact, I told my son we could sit in the general admission section where he and his Sioux City friend usually sat.

He tentatively told me that I may not be comfortable in the cheap seats because it “gets real rowdy up there.” Yep, the old man probably couldn’t handle the rowdiness. I was in my late 40s, but realized how old I must have seemed to my barely 20-year-old son.

Games at Wrigley were interesting, too. We were always on vacation when we attended Cubs games, so I was fascinated with how so many people could get away from work for an afternoon game in the middle of the week.

At one game, we ended up sitting near a group of young adults — men and women — who were drinking way too much beer. Before long, one of them vomited and his friends moved to other seats. Meanwhile, we were left with the stench of beer-filled barf wafting up from where they had sat.

My son has long been an adult and goes to baseball games with his friends. It’s been a long time since I’ve attended a major league game.

While I miss the ballpark ambience, I don’t miss the crowds, being squeezed into tiny seats in rows too close to one another and the mess in the parking lot after the game.