STRAIGHT UP MIDNIGHTAN INTRODUCTORY NOTEWell, look at this—we’re all here. We made it back again. I hope you’re half as happy tobe here as I am. Just saying that reminds me of a story, and since telling stories is what I dofor a living (and to keep myself sane), I’ll pass this one along.Earlier this year—I’m writing this in late July of 1989—I was crashed out in front of theTV, watching the Boston Red Sox play the Milwaukee Brewers. Robin Yount of the Brewersstepped to the plate, and the Boston commentators began marvelling at the fact that Yountwas still in his early thirties. “Sometimes it seems that Robin helped Abner Doubleday laydown the first set of foul lines,” Ned Martin said as Yount stepped into the box to face RogerClemens.“Yep,” Joe Castiglione agreed. “He came to the Brewers right out of high school, I think—he’s been playing for them since 1974.”I sat up so fast I nearly spilled a can of Pepsi-Cola all over myself. Wait a minute! I wasthinking. Wait just a goddam minute! I published my first book in 1974! That wasn’t so long ago!What’s this shit about helping Abner Doubleday put down the first set of foul lines?Then it occurred to me that the perception of how time passes—a subject which comes upagain and again in the stories which follow—is a highly individual thing. It’s true that thepublication of Carrie in the spring of 1974 (it was published, in fact, just two days beforebaseball season began and a teenager named Robin Yount played his first game for theMilwaukee Brewers) doesn’t seem like a long time ago to me subjectively—just a quickglance back over the shoulder, in fact—but there are other ways to count the years, and someof them suggest that fifteen years can be a long time, indeed.In 1974 Gerald Ford was President and the Shah was still running the show in Iran. JohnLennon was alive, and so was Elvis Presley. Donny Osmond was singing with his brothersand sisters in a high, piping voice. Home video cassette recorders had been invented…