Why This Win Means so Much More
The Boston Red Sox are the 2013 World Series champions—our third title in ten years. This still feels like a novelty to me, given that our victory just nine years ago was our first in eighty-six years when we broke the dreaded curse. This is made all the more impressive in comparison to our performance last season, where the Sox were last in the AL East, and third from the bottom in the American League. This year was supposed to be a rebuilding year, but instead we won. We’re the champs. It’s still surreal.
How We All Felt
But I think this year, more than any year, we as a city, as Red Sox Nation, needed this. This championship is the embodiment of the city’s new unofficial motto, “Boston Strong.” These two words are our encouragement to keep going, to keep fighting, for the victims to keep working at getting better every day. This city has grown even stronger since the tragic events in April, and the Red Sox have played a major role in that. Boston has some of the most rabid sports fans in the country, and this team’s devotion to the city, especially in our time of crisis, was nothing short of amazing.
David Ortiz is right: this is our &%!*^#@ city and this championship was for us. The World Series trophy, and even Ortiz’s MVP award is for the citizens of Boston and Red Sox Nation; for Martin Richard, Krystle Campbell, Lingzi Lu, and Sean Collier. This is for Jeff Bauman, and Celeste and Sydney Corcoran, and the Brassards, and Brittany Loring, and Officer Richard Donohue. This is for everyone who was injured, physically and emotionally that day. This is for us.
Even more for me personally, this series and this win is for my Aunt Linda. Growing up in my family, being a Sox fan is a birthright, and Linda was one of the biggest fans of our bunch. Just like her father, you could find her sitting deep in a chair on game day, wearing her cap, and cheering along with the game. Or, given the Sox for most of her life, yelling at the game (this is a habit I have also picked up, but I add in some more colorful language and nicknames for the players). Linda passed away in March after a battle with cancer.
As the Sox progressed through the post-season, I thought of her more and more. I know she would have been elated at how well we were doing and how far we were progressing. When we clinched the pennant, my first thought as I danced around my living room to “Dirty Water” and “Sweet Caroline” was “this one’s for Linda.” And that was that. Although it wasn’t as easy a series as it was in 2004 or 2007 (obstruction calls, anyone?), I was convinced we would win, and would win it for her. There was no better way to honor her memory.
My mother watched the games from Florida with her hat, her Wally, and a photo of Linda by her side.
The Sox brought the victory back to Fenway for the first time in nearly a century. It was worth going to Game 6 to see it happen on our turf. In our &%!*^#@ city. I was incredibly emotional that night because this victory meant so much more. It was for Linda. It was for the victims. It was for Boston. It was for us.
Thank you, Red Sox, thank you.
2013 World Series Championship flag is already hanging outside of Fenway
(Courtesy Brian Baldeck)
Who Says You Can’t Go Home?
I can’t. I can’t go home. At least not really.
The house that was.
This past Monday, my parents closed on their house, and that same day packed the last of their belongings and hit the sunny trail to a retired life in Florida. While I am beyond thrilled that they are finally following their dreams and relocating for warmer climes and far superior diving, it is still…odd. The house that I called home for years no longer belongs to a member of my family. My strongest connection to my hometown, where I lived until I moved to Boston for college, is gone.
Londonderry, NH is and always will be a part of my identity. It helped to shape
Idyllic, no?
who I am, and has been the base of many fond memories (and many memories that I wish I could forget). Yet having this house was like my security blanket of familiarity. I liked knowing that I could drive up 93, and get off exit 4, and I could pass the standard landmarks that I now feel a strange nostalgia for, and sail into the driveway. The sale of this house of course does not bar me from visiting Londonderry; from driving the hilly back roads, or passing the seemingly countless apple orchards, or getting ice cream from Mack’s in the summer, yet it does not feel the same. Not having the tether of a house filled with my parents and their belongings makes me feel like I would be a visitor in my hometown.
The Londonderry Marching Lancers are world famous.
But is that really a bad thing? Leaving Londonderry for Boston to attend college was one of the best choices I ever made, and my recent move to Virginia for school and my future career is proving to be another smart choice. So do I really need this house to be the manifestation of my past? Does the house mean that it’s not home?
I know this strange feeling will fade, as will this sudden attachment to the idealized notion of home. We all need to keep moving forward, and the sale of the house is helping my parents move forward. I think it will help me too.
My Year of Gratitude, Day One
Here is the blog post for my first day in my Grateful 365 project. I won’t be posting those daily as I ideally want them to be separate (yet parallel) blogs, but today will be the exception. Please click on the “Grateful 365” link on the left side of the page under my blogroll. You can also get there by going to the community section of the Grateful Nation website.
January 1st, 2010
Welcome to 2010!
I am ready for this new year and all the challenges and successes, ups and downs it will bring.
But on to business.
It can be assumed that many of the things or people I blog about being grateful for are not one-day or one-time occurrences. Some of these people and things I am grateful for every day but they will only be stated once. Here is my biggest one.
I am grateful for my mother, Kim.
My mother has been my largest influence my entire life. I can say with complete confidence that I would not be where and who I am today without her unwavering and unconditional love, support and care.
She and I have inside jokes, I can talk with her about basically anything, and she always lends an ear when I call her nearly daily to talk of the minor successes or failures in my life. She makes positive and constructive suggestions so I can continue to grow. She encourages me to do whatever is my heart’s desire.
My mother is the most amazing person I know, and if I can be even a fraction of the woman she is, I will consider that to be a huge personal success. I am grateful that she is such a major part of my life and grateful that she is my mother.
Falling Feet First 