So what if it was only 16 years, I was ready!
October 28, 2004 ~ 4:12 p.m.
It has so often been said that the longer you have to wait for something, the better and more meaningful will be the moment when you get it.
So it is not without some guilt that I witnessed the Boston Red Sox win the World Series Championship. I�m just a week shy of my 35th birthday, for Chrissakes. Although I think sixteen years spent passionately waiting for this to occur is quite long, others have been waiting much longer. How on earth can I�Red Sox fan since only 1988�celebrate alongside my father (which I surely would have done were I not in England) when he�s got nearly 50 years more experience watching this team fail and come up short?
But I ain�t gonna worry about that, because though it�s only been sixteen years, I was a bona fide Red Sox fan. I wasn�t just on the wagon; I contributed to the massive down payment on it, signed (or stained?) with the sweat and tears, and surely a bit of blood, by the hundreds of millions-strong Red Sox Nation. I endured sixteen angst-filled, disappointing years.
When you get to the heart of the matter, with each year I took the Sox failures of past and present on a personal level. With every year, I resented the Yankees more and more. By the time the new millennium had seen the light of dawn, I was ready, but far from sure. I knew of the legend they called �the Curse,� and had seriously wondered if there was anything to it. To tell you the truth, I�m still unsure that it didn�t really exist.
To wit, this is what I think the Babe said to the baseball gods:
�The Red Sox shall suffer a century of defeat, second-place finishes and a distinct lack of World Championships, but backdated to 1903, the year they won their first World Series. After the 2003 season has ended, let the curse be lifted and the Red Sox win as they will.�
Curse or not, this victory means so much for the fandom, and for the city of Boston. While the New England Patriots have given us reason to be proud, and even as they�re in the midst of making their run for a third SuperBowl title, let�s face it � It was a BoSox championship that people coveted most. And this is what we all will hold the closest to our hearts.
No more wearing my heart out on my sleeves. No more wanting to hang two red socks up on a corkboard and throw darts at them. No more sighing and wondering why or what if. Playing the �what if� game is great for intelligent conversation. But if given the choice of winning or discussing at length how we might have won, it�s really no contest.
I don�t give two shits if being a Red Sox fan will never be the same again. This is a good thing. It�s a new era for Sox fans, and we need to enjoy it and move on.
� M.E.M.
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Copyright � 2001-2007 by M.E. Manning. All material is written by me, unless explicitly stated otherwise by use of footnotes or bylines. Do not copy or redistribute without my permission.
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