What the Cubs mean to me

It started simple enough. I wanted to be just like my big brother.
I went where he went.
I did what he did.
I liked what he liked.

For me, this meant I was destined to be Chicago Cubs fan.

Some of my earliest memories are watching games on WGN with Steve Stone and Harry Carey calling the action of my beloved Cubbies. It was probably good I had no idea what curses were or why it mattered the Cubs didn't win very much. I knew there was something special in the ivy and blue pin stripes. I had no idea what the "Friendly Confines of Wrigley Field" meant, and honestly, I didn't care.

To me, baseball was life. The Cubs were my team. Simple as that.

As I grew older and more sophisticated, the Cubs became more and more of my routine. I began to carefully look at the box scores and stats of my favorite players. I grieved when Andre Dawson moved on; I adopted Mark Grace as my favorite player. I learned to savor the talents of Steve Beuchele, Shawon Dunston, Glenalen Hill, and Rick Wilkins. In retrospect, they were not good. But it still didnt' matter, they were my team.

When Opening Day would roll around, I would tape the game so that I could watch it when I got home from school. During the awful years of the early 1990s at times I kept a diary where I wrote down facts from the game - I guess I missed my calling to be a sports writer.

Before I knew it, they were a way of life. Tuning in to games was a right of passage that meant spring was here and summer was near. During the summer, it was better, I could watch them everyday. I loved the day games. I still do. Wrigley at night is nowhere near as fun.

The downside of this affection comes when we lost - which happened alot.

Then 2003 happened. It was my freshman year of college. Everything was good. The Cubs were destined to win and made it to within five outs against the Marlins. Then Steve Bartman and the greatest collapse of this or any other millenium... That was game 6. I remember game 7. I was in my dorm room and watched Kerry Wood hit a home run. I didn't fight it - I knew it was destiny.

I went about my business going to Campus Crusade hoping to come home to catch the end of the game. By the time I was back, it was too late. The Cubs were floundering. A heavy cloud descended... then it was over.

The next day in class a professor brought it up. The look in my face told her all she needed to know. We moved on. I didn't talk about it anymore.

Then 2008. Made the playoffs. Got swept by the Dodgers. The same knot came back into my stomach. The knot that tells me I love a baseball team too much. The knot that says I'm a real fan. The knot that will probably kill me before the Cubs win it all....

That sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach is what the Cubs mean to me. It's the same feeling that makes me think they can always come back, they can always pull it out when they never seem to be able to. But I hope. You know, that is a better way to put it -

To me the Cubs are about hope. They are about a genuine joy that is out there waiting for me.

Any team can have a bad century. I'll wait another one if that is what it takes to finally see that World Series win.

Until then, I enjoy the game. I hope.