Red Sox Nation
Red Sox fever has swept our household, and I�m not ashamed to admit it.
As a lifelong resident of Massachusetts, my fascination with the Red Sox began relatively late. I had never even attended a baseball game until 1990, when I was in summer camp before my senior year of high school. My journalism teacher, Charlie Gofen, decided to take us all to Fenway one night for “educational” purposes. I suspect he had his own nefarious reasons for linking the field trip to journalism, but I still learned something. I learned that I knew nothing about baseball.
For starters, three innings came and went before I realized that the game had even started. I�d assumed the players were just warming up on the field, and eventually it occurred to me that they were taking an awfully long time to warm up. By the time I caught on that game play had commenced, it was nearly time to leave. Subway schedules dictated that we leave early to make curfew, and they didn�t give a damn that I’d only seen two innings.
I’ve been to one other game since then, and the only impression that game left on me was that Nomar was awfully cute when he bunted. Nomar quickly became my favorite player, which was unsurprising when you considered that he was the only player I actually recognized.
Last year when the Red Sox made it to the playoffs, Chris and I watched them lose against the Yankees. Normally we wouldn’t have spent our precious TV time on baseball, but we were living in a 300 square foot hotel room with three dogs and a lawsuit. We had no books, no games, and no friends. Given that situation, it was only natural that we turned to the TV for solace, and all that was on was baseball.
During those difficult days, the Red Sox helped get our minds off our living situation. Things could have been worse, we learned, and mostly they would have been worse had we been Red Sox fans.
This year I’ve had to give up my Nomar crush. I’ve graduated to a preference for Johnny Damon, partly and mostly inspired by being able to recognize him immediately by his wild mop of hair. David Ortiz is a close second with me. Maybe it’s because he’s quiet, but he just seems like such a nice guy. And he’s no slouch at batting during clutch time, either.
And Chris? Chris is a Patriots guy, plain and simple. I don’t know how many fantasy football leagues he’s in, and it’s probably better that way. In the past, he’s professed a disdain for those boring baseball games, but this year he’s changed. He’s started watching baseball, even when it means that I interrupt him every time the camera lingers on a face in the audience — “Who’s that? Is that anyone famous?”
This post-season, we’ve finally begun to understand a little of what true Red Sox fans must feel. If the Red Sox persisted in getting annihilated night after night, a Red Sox fan would merely be an anomaly - a rare, somewhat perplexing creature whose motives are difficult to understand. But the Red Sox have a way of getting into your heart, and of rallying just when you thought you’d given up all hope.
A Red Sox fan knows there are no such things as guarantees. Even in the bottom of the ninth inning of a 2 run lead over the Yankees, we fear that something will happen or someone will screw up, and the Red Sox will lose. Stranger things have happened, and so we watch the games, staying up too late night after night, waiting for our little hearts to be crushed even as we harden them against disappointment.
Three games lost, three games won. Maybe part of being a Red Sox fan is knowing that there is no way of knowing what tonight will bring.
Posted by: ssjane | October 20, 2004 | 10:32 am
Posted in: Entertainment/News