Friday, October 2, 2009

There's Only One Soxtober

When I woke up this morning, it was forty-three degrees in Hartford. I looked out the window, and the big maple tree on the lawn was brindled in red and gold. Fall is my favorite season, and it's officially here.

Full disclosure: Autumn was my favorite season before I was even aware that there was such a thing as Major League Baseball. ( I'm from the White Mountains in New Hampshire, and there's no foliage that can beat our foliage.)


When I was a little kid, my favorite thing to do was play in the piles of leaves in my front yard, at least until I got a rake handed to me at the age of six. However, when I discovered the wonderful world of the Boston Red Sox, my favorite time of year took on a whole new meaning.

Because I'm on the younger side, my first Sox related heartbreak was in 2003: Tim Wakefield is the classiest man I can think of, and the look on his face as he walked off the mound that night at Yankee Stadium broke my heart. Of course, what happened just a short year later all but erased that from the collective psyche of New England, but the excitement of the season is a constant.

Every year, when I feel the crispness start to creep into the air, and leaves begin to get the slightest tinge of yellow, I look forward to Soxtober (the only other franchise that can rival that catchphrase? Colorado, with "Rocktober"). NESN is right: I live for this.



Remember when Dane Cook was the height of cool? Still, this ad gives me goosebumps - in a good way.

4 comments:

  1. I love fall, specifically for Fall Ball. I can't remember where I saw this or who said it but..."On a clear night at Fenway, you can see October." And it's the truth.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm slightly older - 25 - so I (vaguely) remember when Wakefield first came to the Red Sox. Nobody really believed his success was sustainable, but I bought one of those roster t-shirts anyway, which was more impressive back in the day because they cost $35, because they weren't mass-produced at Bob's yet.

    Because of that, I've always tried to pull for "unlikely" success stories with the Sox since then. My other jerseys are Mark Bellhorn and Jed Lowrie, so I'm only 1/3, excluding Bellhorn's 2004 season, which was awesome.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Everyone was awesome in 2004. Oh, the memories...

    ReplyDelete