Growing Up a Cubs Fan

When I was a kid, the summer could be a lonely time.

My family lived out on a rural route in Illinois, a house with a big yard next to a big lake. There weren't any kids for a couple of miles around, and when you don't have access to a car, they might as well have been in the next state.

So, I learned to entertain myself, and for the most part that would involve the mindless hum of a television set or the frenzied uselessness of video games. By the time I was twelve, I knew far more about Mario and Luigi than I did about the town I lived in, and it was around that time that my father took pity on me and brought me out into our wide yellow-green yard with a pair of baseball mitts (both left handed) and a couple of baseballs.

I still remember standing out there, impatient, the late afternoon sun beating my pasty white nerd body as I squinted to see my father standing with an old tattered Cubs hat across the lawn.

"You just watch the ball. No matter what else, you just keep your eye on the ball."

And then it was sailing across the grass, a speeding grounder that flew through my legs and up against some firewood behind me.

"That's alright. Go get it."

I started to walk towards the ball.

"C'mon, hustle. Run!"

When my dad tells you to run, you pick it up a little bit.

It seems like a trite idea, now, that a father and his son could bond over a couple of baseballs at the end of a hot Illinois summer, and at the time, it seemed to my nearsighted eyes like more of a pain than anything else. But we went out there nearly every afternoon for a couple of hours, my dad throwing the ball and teaching me the fundamentals while I rushed in for pop-ups, dove to the grass for the grounders, and crossed my arm for catches to my right side. Pretty soon, I was loving those afternoons. I never got good at baseball, but I learned the fundamentals(Mario never taught me those).

The exceptions to those afternoons were nights when there was a later Cubs game; my dad had to conserve his energy for those. We'd sit up, me asking questions about the game and him answering patiently. He taught me, during these games, how to be a Cubs fan; how to not turn off the game when things got rough, how to stick it out with the greatest team that's ever played baseball even if they don't win this year, next year, or the year after that. I learned that Cubs fans don't root for their players, they root for their team. Cubs fans boo players when they deserve it. Cubs fans pass your father the ketchup.

Cubs fans are better than Cardinals fans.

Then, in that golden '98 season, we seemed to have a chance, and my attention to baseball reached full throttle. We watched the home run race between Sosa and McGwire, but we were more interested in the Cubs' chances at the wild card. Unlike Cards fans, we had a real season to watch.

You know the history. The Cubs lost that season. Didn't matter, we had a good time. We started talking about the next season, but where other teams might focus on the end, the Fall classic, the ring; we're looking at the ride there (and the beers and brats along the way).

We were Cubs fans. Still are. And now, almost a decade later, the Cubs seam to really have a chance, again. And when I've got a game on, I know that the second something amazing happens I can call over and hear my dad on the other end of the line, celebrating the Team.

We might win, we might lose. If we win, we'll get drunk, and if we lose, we'll get drunker. What other baseball fans don't understand is that the Cubs don't need to win to be a great team. The joy in watching the Cubs is the joy of being focused, the smell of a lawn in summer, the excitement of the win and the pain of defeat. All of it experienced, none of it sacrificed.

Keep the TV or the radio on. Keep your family with you. Keep your eye on the ball.

And pass me the ketchup while you're up.