For the love of the game

I love baseball. And I am a huge Red Sox fan.

Say what you will about the annoying "Reverse the Curse" signs and the belligerent fans who shout their hatred of all things Yankees, the "There's always next year" and "Save Fenway" bumper stickers - I love the game.

My love affair with baseball started early. As an only child, I had to play two roles: my mother's daughter and also my father's son. Playing the role of tomboy, I spent countless hours sitting on bleachers at every game Dadso and I could find - MLB, AA and AAA, High School and College games - we saw it all and loved it.

To this day I prefer to sit in the bleacher seats (approximately Section 36, row 20 at Fenway Park) so that I can be in perfect alignment behind the pitcher so I can call each pitch and see the game from the pitcher's point of view.

Before the rest of the family came along, Dadso and I spent many summer evenings watching baseball on the couch or racing down to Boston to catch a Red Sox game after work.  There were countless trips to Mecca (Cooperstown, NY), and endless searches for the perfect baseball cap.  When kids started wearing their caps backwards, Dadso made a point to tell me - repeatedly - that "when he was a kid" he always wore his cap backwards because he played catcher. This somehow made him a trendsetter...

We ate too many sausages on Yawkey Way, stuffed ourselves with peanuts, and did the wave as if the outcome of the game depended entirely on our zeal and vigor.

Of all the fun things Dadso and I did together in my childhood (and there are many), memories that involve baseball are without a doubt my favorite.

My shared love of America's favorite pastime did not end with Dadso.  I had the distinct privilege of growing up in the same household as my maternal grandmother.  A Red Sox fan since childhood, she had never, as I had never, seen the home team win a World Series. That is, until October 2004. I will spare you the recap of the come-from-behind ALCS win, beating the hated Yankees into submission, followed by the best four games of my life to that date. You saw the papers, you know the story.

I watched many of the games - staying up far past my bed time - with my then 83 year old grandmother.  She had been born just three years after the Red Sox' last World Series win and, as you may imagine, was glued to the couch for every game. For a woman whose regular bed time was 7pm, staying up for the games was a real challenge. We faithful kept each other up, sharing the role of coffee maker and snack retriever. We did it together; it was our thing.

If you remember the final game of the 2004 World Series, then you remember, as I do, that the planets aligned to bring the Red Sox their first win in 86 years. I mean this literally, of course, as there was, on the night of the fourth and final game of the season, a lunar eclipse.  

This was another first for me, as I had never seen that happen, either.

I watched the game with my dad that night, and was on the phone with my grandmother for nearly every play. When we won (yes, Red Sox fans say "we" like The Nation had something to do with the win), Dadso and I hugged and looked at each other, stunned but thrilled. I immediately called my grandmother to celebrate and tell her I was on the way home.

I will never forget the look on her face when I walked through the door. Her eyes were shining and she was glowing with tears in her eyes.  My grandmother almost never smiled, hardly ever looked joyful - a typical New Englander. I can barely remember a time when she was that happy.  Thinking about it now I still get misty-eyed - how much baseball meant to her and how special it was that it was something we shared.

My grandmother did not live to see the Sox win again in 2007, making the win bitter sweet. I know she would have loved it - I would have loved to have shared it with her - but I am so thankful that she got to see the boys win just once in her lifetime.


So why blog about baseball in January, you ask? Because baseball is more than just a game - it's a way of life. For me, it is also a way of connecting with my family.

I was reminded of that today when I came home to find "A League of Their Own" on television.  "A League of Their Own" is one of those movies that I can watch over and over and never get tired of; if I catch it on television - no matter how far into the movie - I have to sit down and watch the whole thing. I just can't help myself.

I love so much about this movie: Geena Davis, Tom Hanks, Madonna, the WWII era clothes and cars, the family dynamics of the characters and, of course, the baseball.

I cry at the end of the movie every time - and each time for a different reason. Sometimes I get sniffly because Bob (Bill Pullman) returns from war, other times because the Peaches are so let down that they do not win, and still other times because I love the expression on Dottie Hinson's (Geena Davis) face when she sees how happy her kid sister Kit Keller (Lori Petty) is to have not only won the first ever World Series of the AAGPBL but to have finally stepped out of the shadow of her big sister.

Watching this movie today made me miss my grandmother more than I can say and it made me think of how grateful I am to have had baseball to share with her and to continue to share with Dadso.

I think every family needs that special something that brings everyone together and in my family it is the love of the game.