BOSTON - Her baby, Christopher, then 7 months old, was asleep in his crib. Her husband, Jeff, one of the nonbelievers, had also gone to bed.
Dale Scott, it seemed, would be a witness to history all alone. And that was fine with her. It was Oct. 25, 1986, and her Red Sox were one strike away from winning their first World Series since 1918.
"I was crying with joy," Scott said.
Minutes later, it was over. Bob Stanley had thrown a wild pitch. A ball had gone between Bill Buckner's legs. The Mets scored three runs in the 10th, and the Red Sox had lost again.
She walked into the kitchen where the night's dishes had been washed and stacked. Scott was flinging pots when her husband came running.
"He kept saying it was just a game. That the baby was going to cry. I said, "You don't get it, do you?"' Scott recalled. "I said, "It's okay if the baby cries. He'll be a Red Sox fan, he might as well learn now."'
Today, Christopher is 18. He's never seen the Red Sox win a World Series. Nor, for that matter, has his mother. Or her parents.
Still, they keep the faith. As if they have a choice. As if there were so many other alternatives. It's not an obsession as much as an obligation. A sense of duty. The virtue and, yes, the burden of loyalty.
Their time has come again. The Sox begin the World Series tonight against the Cardinals. But to Boston fans of a certain bent, it is not simply the championship of 2004. It is the accumulation of all those years. The 85 seasons that have gone unfulfilled. The mothers and fathers, grandparents and teachers, friends and siblings who have waited, together and apart.
These days, baseball is the national pastime in name only. It has been eclipsed by football in some areas, by basketball in others.
Not here. Not even while the Celtics, Bruins and Patriots were winning championships. Baseball and the Red Sox are as much a part of the identity of the region as Harvard or the Kennedys.
"The Red Sox and their fans are like the old married couple that have been together for 50 years," said Shaun Kelly, a teacher in Greenwich, Conn. "They scream and argue, but they know they're stuck with each other. They know neither will ever leave the other. Being a Red Sox fan is like a prearranged marriage set up by our parents. We had no choice.
"I don't want to knock other towns, but we're dealing with a generational thing here. It's been passed down. They talk about the Red Sox ghosts? It's not Enos Slaughter or Bucky Dent. You go to Fenway and close your eyes and you see your father or grandfather sitting next to you. Those are the ghosts. And they'll be there for eternity, helping us through."
They are gathering. On Yawkey Way in front of Fenway Park, where the road is closed, the vendors have descended and the tents have gone up for those hopeful of scoring Series tickets. In the Cask "n Flagon bar and grill, famously located just beyond the Green Monster in leftfield.
They are gathering. In parks and restaurants. On street corners and in each other's homes. On the Internet, where a thread was started listing the people the Sox should win it for. Within 48 hours, the site had more than 44,000 hits and hundreds of replies from nameless Sox fans.
Win it for my grandfather, born right after the Sox won in 1918 and then passed away a week after the loss in '86, devastated and heartbroken. Win it so I can go down with a Guinness and drink one with him at the grave site. Win so I can cry tears I've never cried.
Davejstice
There is a touch of sadness in Red Sox fans. And maybe a madness too. How is it they can be so devoted to something that has been so disheartening?
Other teams have gone long periods without success, but none can match Boston for heartbreak and torment. Six times since 1946, the Sox have been within a victory of winning a World Series. Six times, they've lost.
No team has seen so many titles and pennants lost so cruelly. Other people talk of curses. Red Sox fans won't hear of it. They just seem to expect suffering as some sort of exercise in fatalism.
"To be a Red Sox fan is to be perpetually disappointed," said Chaz Scoggins, official scorer in Boston for 26 years. "They pretend to be optimistic, but deep down believe something will happen. It's like they're waiting for that moment when it all goes wrong."
There are those who believe it will all change with a victory. That by this time next week, the Sox may have won a Series and lost their singular cachet. Maybe they have a point. Maybe that's true.
But don't you suppose it's worth the risk?
Win it for my father, who had a love for numbers and baseball, and passed it on to me. It was the only way we could communicate, but it was always a safe haven.
CheekyDave
Every Red Sox season is like a sign post for a life. The Impossible Dream of '67? That might have been the year you graduated from high school. The collapse of '74? Got married that summer. The '78 playoff game ruined by the Yankees' Bucky Dent? Maybe the last time your parents were both alive to see the Sox.
The point is the Red Sox are intertwined with New England life. It isn't about bumper stickers or flags hanging out of car windows. It's not fans arriving late for the bandwagon, or jumping off early when things go wrong.
Do you know how easy it is to be a Yankees fan? To know pennants are never far off, and a World Series is around the bend?
Try being a fan of a team that never has the last dance. A team never invited to the White House. A team a few hours up the road from New York, where championships are taken for granted and used as regional insults.
Cheri Giffin, president of the BoSox fan club, tells the story of her father traveling to New York in 1949 and sleeping on a sidewalk outside of Yankee Stadium. Boston needed to win one of two games to clinch the pennant.
It lost both.
"He's become furiously embittered," Giffin said. "He called me before Sunday's game and said, "I don't know why you go. They're just going to break your heart.' That attitude has become his defense mechanism. His heart has been broken so many times.
"He's 83 and I don't know how much longer he's going to be on this earth. I wanted to say, "Daddy, I just hope they win the World Series in the next 10 days and you can finally get your wish.'
"You know, once the Red Sox get in your blood it's like a disease. You can't rid your body of them."
Win it for my son James who was born on Sept. 30. He is the cutest kid in the world and the Sox are 6-0 when he watches the game on his father's lap. Unfortunately James has Down Syndrome. ... He is truly a special kid, and he deserves to grow up to know the joy and strength he has brought us may somehow magically help the Sox win. And, yes, he will be on my lap tonight.
Clears Cleaver
Some say it is the New England ethos. Others will claim it has something to do with the Irish in their blood. Whatever the factor, a lot of Red Sox fans have a sense of levity about their passion.
It might be because they haven't won enough to be arrogant. Or maybe because they've suffered enough to understand perspective. Either way, there is a lightness to their passion that you wouldn't think possible.
The story is told of an Opening Day in the 1980s. Roger Clemens is pitching and the Sox are up 10-0. The Royals, who have done nothing to this point, manage a bloop single. From the back of the bleachers, a voice roars:
"Here they go again."
They've said it before, but this year feels different. This year feels as if it might be the one. The franchise that has blown so many leads has just competed the greatest comeback in baseball history against the Yankees.
The sons and daughters, and grandsons and granddaughters, of Red Sox fans are preparing for the moment that has literally been a lifetime in the making.
Kelly, the teacher from Connecticut, was reminded of this during Game 7 of the Yankees series. Because it was a school night, he had to put his 10-year-old son, Max, to bed in the fourth inning.
"Before he went to bed, I told him not to be disappointed if he woke up the next morning and the Sox had lost. That it already had been a grand and glorious season," Kelly said. "I thought about it later, and that was just what my mother had said to me in '67."
Win it for my 2-year-old and every other kid in New England who won't have to grow up being told ... the Sox can never win.
