Apollo used to be an Olympic-class archer, a toxophilite of the first rank, until he took a bribe from a betting syndicate and blew a contest he should have won easily.

Almost hypnotized by the distant glow, by that ghost-light that spun and bobbed over the dark mound, the boy stared for a time. Between fear and cold, he became unaware even of his own shaking. Minutes later, racing along, the boy felt that something was wrong. While he should have felt relief at leaving that forsaken encampment, his stomach felt leaden. The hairs on the back of his neck were prickling. Turning, he saw the streaming ball of bilious light, winding its way through the air behind him. The ghost was chasing him.

The euphoria of discovery conveyed by Richard Greenberg through a gay outsider who becomes an impassioned baseball fan hasn’t dimmed a bit in the two decades since Take Me Out was first produced. Other things, however, have changed …. Issues that once seemed too reflective of the playwright’s hand at work now seem urgently keyed into a contemporary world in which masculine anxiety and its bilious consequences are being held up for scrutiny.

It didn’t take long before my rapidly thinning wallet made me see I had to modify this habit. What’s more, I discovered there were many parts of the world in which my New York City-style baksheesh was considered inappropriate, even eccentric. In tip-free Japan, where cash is king, and prices, by custom, include all services, I’ve actually had hotel housekeepers chase after me with the tip I’d left for them in the room.

The sidewalk thrummed with relentless energy. I was immediately enshrouded in a scrim of shouts, laughter, arguments, haggling, vigorous demands for baksheesh. The Cairenes shoved past in djellabas and jeans, T-shirts and head scarves. You could still see men wearing red fezzes, tassels wagging as they rushed by. The temperature was well over 100, but no one wore shorts.