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I love my White Sox. How in the world could I have married a cub fan? How was I to know? Love is blind and I didn't see it! This could have ended in disaster but with a little hard work (needed in any relationship), we survived and are still surviving!

It begins in February every year. Spring Training Camp! We have waited another year! And now! It is the "next year." Well! It's a whole new season this year and we are rejuvenated with hope and expectation! The Sox will do better than that other team! My other half snarls a snicker of disagreement.

He touts the new arrivals. "Look at pitching and hitting! Base running and fielding! We'll the team this year!"

"Right!" I retort. "Your team is bush league! Just you wait until the first head-to-head series ! Then you'll see what a real Major League team can do!"

It is the biggest rival in the city of Chicago- the perennial battle between the Sox and that other team on the north side of Chicago. I grew up on the South Side, any self respecting bar would cast out any TV that showed a game featuring the Wiggly Wonders! My mate grew up in the "burbs." The area surrounding Wiggly Field are filled with the North side element- snobs, yups and want-to-be's. It must be like that in the burbs. South side Sox fans tend to be decent, hard working folk who support their families and go to church. I can't help it that my mate is a Fascist, snob, anti-family, atheistic puppy but I still love him. In the end, when the Sox have triumphed over that other team, we can still smile at each other and hug and kiss and all that other stuff. It may take a day or two but eventually all is normal again. September through February are great months.

We often stay silent about sport's teams unless there is a face-to-face series. Then its all hell within the house. No breakfast nor dinner! You're on your own. The tense feud makes the McCoy-Hatfield dispute a minor misunderstanding. There are few words that pass. The air is filled with static energy and tension. At a game's end, a smile from the victor grinds salt into the wound returned with a grimace of malice. The end of the series is marked by a triumphant twitter from the series's victor. The vanquished mutters "Next time!" A series sweep last year resulted in a new broom for the house. Ha-Ha! (A fluke play and a bad call and a lucky hit and)

As the season winds down the rivalry usual diminishes as our teams slip from second to third to fourth to On a rare occasion, one or both of our teams may

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