15 Years Later

Have either of us mentioned yet that we love baseball?

Discovering baseball in my childhood and adolescent years changed the way I appreciated sports.  Traveling to new baseball stadiums as an adult cemented that love forever.  But that’s not the end of the story.

There’s a video of a sea of fans on the streets outside of Wrigley Field.  They explode into pure joy as they all watch the Cubs record the final out of Game 7 to win their first World Series in over a century.  I’ve rewatched that video hundreds of times.  Literally, like by the actual definition.  It still gives me goosebumps, and sometimes still brings tears to my eyes.

It was indeed the purest of joy.  I barely slept that night.  The next day I drove an hour to school listening to the radio, and every time I’d hear, “Your World Series Champion Chicago Cubs,” I would cry, and then laugh.  You know, like a crazy person.

That night was very special to me as a Cubs fan.  But it was even more important to me as a human being.

My mother has always been a good sport about watching sports.  She pays attention. She cheers when something good happens.  She roots for the team that we’re rooting for.  And genuinely enjoys it.

During my younger years playing sports with mixed results, my mom was always very involved.  She came to every soccer, basketball and baseball game.  She got involved with the community atmosphere at every cross-country and track meet.  She cheered hard.  She got into it.  And she continues that trend today as a grandmother.

Still, Mom was never the biggest sports fan.  But she has always been my Champion.

The year before the Cubs won the World Series, they surprised people with a deep run in the playoffs.  They were a young team that wasn’t supposed to be that good just yet.  I was living at home and taking a human anatomy course during evenings in preparation for echo school. 

I wanted to enjoy the playoffs like everyone else, so I recorded each game to watch later.  My mom loyally watched the games as they happened in real time while I was at school, and would be on guard, ready to jump up and stop me from seeing or hearing anything if it hadn’t yet ended when I got home.

Then she would come upstairs, knock on my door, and simply say, “Game’s over.”  She kept a neutral tone and revealed no details.  What a Champion.  My mom was completely onboard to help me experience all of the excitement of watching playoff baseball from the beginning, without knowing the result. 

Yeah, my mom is pretty cool.

One sunny August afternoon a year later, Mom asked me to explain how the Wild Card worked.  Being a casual sports fan, she had never really made the effort to know these things.  And I don’t think anyone could blame her for that.

I really wanted to answer her question, but I know my mother.  If I just explained it for thirty seconds, I’d leave her with more questions than answers.  Sports are not her world.  She wanted to understand.  She wanted to put in the effort to learn, so I put in the time.

I met her a few minutes later at a bench on my parents’ deck with a pad of paper.  I had written down the name of every team, organized into their league divisions.  I created an imaginary win-loss record for each team for the sake of examples, and imagined a playoff bracket on the paper.  I went through the process with her step by step to show her how teams qualified for the playoffs and how the Wild Card worked. 

And she got it.  Within half an hour, a new, true-blue Cubs fan was born.

My mom began watching more baseball.  She quickly learned the finer points of the game, occasionally asking me to clarify the meaning of certain stats or rules.  The more she watched, the more she picked up on.   And the more she learned, the more fun she had.

I surprised her one September night by taking her to a Cubs game.  The Cubs trounced the Reds, and soon-to-be MVP Kris Bryant cracked a big home run.  It was one of the most fun Cubs games I’ve ever been to, because my mom had an absolute blast. 

She kept watching and kept learning.  By the playoffs, my mom and I were having legitimate baseball conversations.  And she was more than keeping up.

That year I watched the playoffs in shifts.  One game with my mom, one with friends.  It was an amazing time.  I had a lot of fun with everyone.  But I had to turn down several invitations for watch parties for that final game of the year.  Sorry guys, Game 7 belongs to Mom.

I missed the first at-bat driving home from school that night.  I had to listen on the radio to Dexter Fowler hit a lead-off home run for the Cubs as I was driving into my parents’ neighborhood.  Coincidentally, as we’ve mentioned, Larsen also listened to that Dexter Fowler lead-off home run from his car radio as he approached his home.

I watched the Cubs win Game 7 of the World Series with my mom and dad.  The Champion and the Legend.  Bryant threw to Rizzo, the Cubs won, my mom and I hugged and yelled and jumped up and down.

And we’ve been enjoying baseball together ever since.

The next year I took her on a tour of Wrigley Field for Mother’s Day.  Safe to say it was a big hit.

Several years later during one of my work contracts in Boston, she came to visit and we went on a tour of Fenway Park.  Then we went to a sports bar and got second place in trivia on a whim.

Honestly, since 2016, my mom has probably watched more baseball than I have.

And because of that – because of baseball, because of the Chicago Cubs – I was able to bond with my mother in a way that will always be special to both of us. 

So, in case by some tragedy you haven’t figured this out yet: 

I love baseball.