You might have heard that the Chicago Cubs won the World Series. It’s an incredible time to live in Chicago. The second that game 7 was over Chicago erupted into cheers and applause as fireworks went off all over the city. I was born and raised a Boston Red Sox fan, but I fell in love with Chicago 8 years ago and am a proud Chicagoan.
I wish I had some amazing story about where I was the moment when that final out was called and the Cubs finally won. I don’t. I was on my couch, dead sober, recovering from having a tooth pulled that day. (That’s a long complicated story about a 9-month long toothache. The moral of that story is that you can have a hole in your tooth and it won’t show up in X-rays). I was so nervous about the tooth that I hadn’t slept the night before, but there I was forcing myself to stay awake and keep cheering. I made Charles sit next to me when the score was tied up and I explained that we were watching what would either go down as one of the most historic baseball games, or the most tragic baseball game ever. (I grew up hearing about Bill Buckner’s error and didn’t want to get my hopes up).
When I moved to Chicago the Cubs were not good … and seemed to be getting worse. They lost 101 games in 2012. I used to jokingly say that I was going to live in Chicago “until the Cubs win the World Series” as a way of saying that I was planning to stay forever.
On November 3rd I woke up and thought, was I on some amazing drugs yesterday …. or did the Cubs really win the World Series?! Then I went up to Wrigley to see World Series Champions up in lights.
My friend Chrissy and I walked around the stadium soaking it all in. You can just barely make out the W flag waving in the wind in this photo.
I started to tear up when I saw the brick wall covered in the names of fans who didn’t live to see the Cubs win it all.
The next day my friend Lauren and I met up to go to the parade. I couldn’t miss the opportunity to see a parade 108 years in the making – especially when it was only a mile and a half from my home.
The city estimates that 5 million people went to the parade and rally. I am so glad that I go to be there. The crowd behaved just as you would expect a bunch of Midwesterners to behave, they were calm and kind but oh so excited.
Did you go to the parade? Watch it at home? I am curious! Also, maybe Theo Epstein should start working his magic on something other than baseball. He’s a living legend.