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I'm one of those people that you hear about. One of the ones that had the grave misfortune of being born into Red Sox Nation. You may have seen the movie, "Fever Pitch," which I feel describes me pretty well. I am a life-long die-hard Red Sox fan (or, LLDH, for short), born-and-bred a 20 minute drive from Fenway Park, our national cathedral. I'm not one of the band-wagon jumpers, who just recently became a fan of the Sox when they started winning. No, I watched the ball go through Buckner's legs, I yelled for Grady to pull Pedro in the sixth, and I tried desperately not to wonder what else could possibly go wrong when Dave Roberts stole second in 2004. Then, "all the pain and heartache was washed away," at least, that's what the news says happened when the Sox won their first World Series in 86 years. But for us LLDHs, who've experienced the inevitable heartbreaks, watching the Sox play will never be a relaxing event.

As I was watching the final game of the 2007 World Series, I felt more anxious that the recent band-wagon jumpers that I mentioned above. They've only been members of the Nation for three years, how could they know? Even with our star closer on the mound in Jonathan Papelbon, I sat on the literal edge of my seat. Paps got into a little bit of trouble, putting some guys on base. It was when Eric Gagne`, the once clutch closer of the Dodgers, and more recently, the Texas Rangers, started warming up, that I had to leave the room.
I was not abandoning my team. No, I was merely practicing superstitious move of leaving the room when your team is doing badly, in the hopes that your position in the room with send messages through the cosmos, telling the coach that he's an idiot, and needs to stop this madness right now. Realizing that the Sox needed me now more than ever, I went back to the exact same seat I was sitting in when they doing well (yet another silly superstition). I did some yoga deep-breathing exercises (the same that I suspect Papelbon does in high-pressure situations like this one), and got ready for the wind-up, and the pitch. HE STRUCK HIM OUT! My mind was suddenly relieved of stress, with hundreds of thoughts flowing simultaneously as I began hugging and high-fiving my friends.
"2004 wasn't a fluke!"
"Thank GOD Francona didn't bring in Gagne`!"
"Holy crap! They just won TWO world series...IN MY LIFETIME!"
I was fortunate enough to go to several big games during the 2007 season (The MLB debut of Daisuke Matsuzaka, the "back-to-back-back-to-back" home run game against the Yankees, Beckett's lights-out performance against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, and a few others), but getting to watch the Red Sox do something that so many people never got to experience in their lifetimes, this was by far one of my favorite moments from the 2007 baseball season.

Learn more about this author, Brian Scalese.
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