Shipping up to Boston

Getting ready to see Boston, there was a tweet from the great author, Stephen King, about how every game for the rest of the Red Sox season should be like the Red Sox and the (New York) Yankees — at a time when the Red Sox beat the Yankees, or something.

With a ticket to Fenway Park, I started to follow the Red Sox, gratified knowing that King was a fan as well. Die-hard fan, I understand — now — how that Red Sox franchise can inspire loyalty.

Reminds me of the rivalry between Dallas Cowboys and the Houston Oilers. Shows an age, now don’t it?

I have fractured childhood memories of baseball, and little to do with any organized sporting activity, preferring, of course, fishing as my “sport” because it is so much more than that.

But baseball, specifically, Red Sox fever is infectious, and a game at Fenway Park, arguably the oldest modern sporting venue in America? Can’t be missed. It’s not just the oddly shaped venue, nor the looming presence of the Green Monster, it’s the unwavering fans, frequently in an untenable position. Absolute definition of “Loyal to a fault.”

From fiction about the area, think I’ve read 45 out of 47 thus far, about crime, Boston, and personalities, the Red Sox are the appeal. Stand on the corner of Boylston and Berkeley Streets. Ride the minimalist “T” and have a lobster roll in Quincy Market. And see a game at Fenway.

Boston Red Sox

Shipping up to Boston

Previously, our Jimmy’s Buffett buddy suggested that Jimmy Buffett and his parrot head show had played Fenway Park. That’s a show I would love to see. Wriggly Field, I guess is on the possible list as well as the Hollywood Bowl, but Fenway, in a New England “summer,” that looks most inviting. Although, Buffett might not be wild enough for Boston.

Down by just a couple, at the top off the ninth, the crude acoustics started echoing Shipping up to Boston by the Dropkick Murphys. 30K+ fans, all singing along? Just leaves me warm and tingly. The Dropkick Murpheys — ask bubba abut that. Punk rock, thug music.

Boston Red Sox

Shipping up to Boston

I picked up my tickets before the current “playoff” run, and the increasing excitement about the team’s prospects. Pacing for a baseball game is different, and it is the ultimate in American pastimes. Like a card game in Las Vegas, though, statistics, numbers, conditions, and what it falls to?

The luck of the draw.

A year ago, almost, I was sitting in the new stadium in Dallas, and I still remember the crack of the bat when that Tampa Bay walk-on hit a home run, bottom of the ninth, and wasn’t enough to rescue Tampa, Dodgers still won, but it was that sound.

The difference, when there was a home run in the bottom of the ninth, in Boston? Go Red Sox, the cheering from the crowd had already drowned out any other noise.

Hearing the Dropkick Murphys song, though, that’s a major win. Hearing while listening as thousands of loyal fans sing along, shouting the lyrics?

Those some small-ass seats in Fenway.

Yankee fans behind us would start to chant, “Go Yankees,” and the surrounding crowd would drown that with a “Yankees Suck” cheer.

Walking back, there was a single kid swimming upstream through the thronging masses. I noticed his shirt, said “Spurs.” Not the San Antonio Spurs, as the title was over a rooster icon. Tottenham Hotspurs.

I still like the Red Sox. Seeing a game there — Fenway Park — an experience of a lifetime.