Abe says, “man, you must be puttin’ me on”
God say, “no.” Abe say, “what?”
God say, “you can do what you want Abe, but
The next time you see me coming you better run”
Well Abe says, “where do want this killin’
Done?”
God says, “out on Highway 61.”
-Bob Dylan, Highway 61 Revisited
Well, for me it was the Interstate 95, rather than Highway 61, which was the route to my crisis of faith.
I must preface all of this by saying that I have always been a Toronto Blue Jays fan. I was first introduced to baseball as a young child in, say, 1986 or 1987, and the rabidity of my Jays fanship has never before wavered.
As is fast becoming our custom, we hit the Kenmore area two hours before game-time on Saturday in order to secure some tickets. After some negotiation, we scored four bleacher seats in the fourth row, directly behind the Red Sox bullpen.
The pitching matchup was, er, interesting. The Red Sox sent the grossly underrated Bronson Arroyo to the hill. The Yankees, as if only to mock the second place Sox, countered with Tanyon Sturtze. In a Boston vs. New York game, there are 25 pitching match-up permutations, and we seemed to have drawn the least awe-inspiring one.
I absolutely adore Fenway Park. It has this effect of distorting one’s sensory perceptions. A crackling, low-quality public address system? Sweet melody. Uncomfortable seats? Like sitting on air. The indeterminately constituted Fenway Frank? Like filet mignon. The odor of stale beer and frank-induced flatulence that permeates Yawkey Way? Like a thousand roses, my friend.
It’s not just the Park, either. It’s the players. Not only do the thoughts of Ruth and Williams and Boggs get one in the mood for baseball, but the current team does too. Pedro and Nomar are heroes to the Fenway fans. Manny’s look goes from “playing in the sandbox with some crayons” at one moment to “focused homerun-hitting machine” the next. The designated hitter looks like the Cookie Monster; the centre fielder looks like Jesus. On a day when they are playing the Yankees, there is - accurately - an underdog feel to the team. Sure the Sox’ payroll is obscene relative to most other clubs, but next to the Yankees’ it seems restrained. The Red Sox are the lesser of two Evil Empires.
From my bleacher seat, I cheered enthusiastically for the Red Sox as the game unfolded. I cheered for Damon when he made a leaping catch at the wall to rob Bernie Williams of an extra-base hit on the first play of the game. I cheered when the Sox scored two runs on consecutive ground-outs in the third inning. I cheered when Varitek hit A-Rod. I felt no real conflict between vocally supporting the Sox and maintaining my Jays fanship. After all, joining in the quasi-vulgar yet poignant refrain of “Yankees Suck” felt perfectly natural to my inner Jays fan. Cursing at Tanyon Sturtze really brought back some memories.
I had been resolute for the entire trip: I was a Jays fan cheering for the Sox only in order to remain inconspicuous amongst the Red New England Horde. But then it happened: my crisis of faith. The first feeling of uncertainly regarding my loyalty to the Jays, ever.
When Garciaparra hit a two-run single in the bottom of the fourth inning, I yelled, “Yeah! Way to Go, Nomah!” My hard “R” had disappeared. Stunned, I looked down to discover that I had just spilled Samuel Adams brand beer on my new Red Sox “Ortiz 34” t-shirt. What has happened to me? I’d been seduced; and I liked it.
I watched the rest of the game not as a Jays fan watching a Sox game, but as a Sox fan. It was new and exciting and it felt good.
As if she knew that her charms were working, as if she knew that she was leading me astray, Fenway offered up the highest of highs in the final inning. The game-winning homerun off of the bat of Bill Mueller soared through the sky and loomed toward me in the bleachers. It hung in the air, and after the rope-a-dope of the relatively unexciting seventh and eighth innings, Fenway knew that she could deliver this knock-out punch to my vulnerable Jays fanship.
The ball landed perhaps fifteen feet in front of me, in the bullpen. I high-fived perfect strangers, I stood and cheered, gleefully stewing in my infidelity.
Back in the hotel, after the game and the celebrations, we turned on the television to catch the highlights. As I tried to decipher my grainy image in the crowd shot of where the homerun landed, I learned from the ticker that Pat Hentgen had retired.
A flood of guilt washed over me. What had I done? The Jays had always been my team, and the knowledge that one of its greatest pitchers had just announced his retirement brought back all of the memories, the joy, the comfort, and the excitement of a lifetime of being a Jays fan. It was one night at Fenway, and the Sox meant nothing to me, I swear. It was only cheering.
