CHICAGO (CBS) — It was Tuesday.  It was the ninth inning.  It was a deep fly ball to left field.  It was perfect.

It was also this, in the words of Zion’s Rick Brown:  “It was the culmination of the best family outing. And to catch a home run by my favorite player – it was surreal.”

Geovany Soto’s ninth-inning dinger on Tuesday ended with a scrum in the bleachers.

“It was chaos,” Kimberly Brown, Rick’s wife, says.  “There were six to 10 people all over our family – cups flying.”

Then Kimberly Brown looked down and it was at her foot.

Even though the Cubs lost, “It was better than best,” Rick Brown says of the family experience.

Tuesday was the Brown family’s first Cubs game and their last — for at least a year. That’s because Rick Brown is a sergeant with the U.S. Army Reserve deploying to Afghanistan on Sunday.  Brown is also a shift supervisor and sergeant for Zion Police Department.

“I get emotional,” said Kimberly Brown.  ”We’re gonna miss him.”

The home run ball will remain on the living room mantle awaiting a homecoming.

The tickets were given to the family by the U.S.O.