As I am writing this the clock reads 12:46 a.m.; almost exactly 25 years ago at this hour, on Oct. 26, 1986, the Red Sox did something that makes the last few awful weeks feel like a dip in an MDC kiddy pool. And ever since the horrific events of Game 6 unfolded, I have lived with the guilt that the Sox should have won the '86 World Series in six games instead of losing it in seven -- if only I had been thinking more sensibly.
It was certainly a chance worth taking, and with my girlfriend Wendy joining us in the old Cruising Vessel (see entry of July 14, 2011 at http://saulwisnia.blogspot.com/2011/07/how-i-lost-my-girlfriend-to-dwight.html) we took off for home and Kenmore Square. The vessel made it in one piece -- which we thought boded well for a successful overall journey. We were wrong.
The tickets did indeed fall through, and although Scott and I went down to Fenway the night of the game, we found nothing in the starving colleague student price range available from scalpers. We wound up watching from a bar as Hurst threw another masterpiece at the Mets, and the Sox headed for Shea Stadium one win away from their first World Series title in 68 years.
Scott and I now changed our thinking. We figured we'd stay in Boston a few more days, (hopefully) watch the Red Sox win Game 6, and then join in the downtown parade. If the Red Sox lost Game 6, we'd also stay for Game 7 and the eventual victory celebration. When Game 6 got under way, Scott headed for a loud locale where he could scream with other Sox fans while I hunkered down with Wendy in the quiet den of my boyhood home to watch the NBC broadcast.
I certainly don't need to tell you what happened that evening at Shea, but I am now ready to explain my culpability. In the 10th inning, once the Red Sox took a 5-3 lead, I started thinking about how I would now be able to shut up Big Dave, Buddha, and the rest of the Mets crazies back on campus.
"Go get my camera," I yelled to Wendy, and as I watched the first two Mets in the bottom of the 10th quickly make outs, Wendy arrived back in the doorway with my Cannon sure-shot and a devilish grin. She knew how much this meant to me, and we agreed the best picture for me to copy and distribute to Mets fans would be a blow-up of me standing beside the TV with my hand raised in a classic middle-fingered salute.
As Gary Carter came up for New York, I had Wendy get the camera ready. Only after Carter singled, and then Kevin Mitchell, and then Ray Knight (making it 5-4), did I realize what was happening and scream for her to stop. But it was too late; moments later Mitchell scored on a wild pitch/passed ball to tie the game, and a moment after that Mookie Wilson hit the ground ball heard 'round the world to Bill Buckner at first. Like generations of Red Sox fans, I had mistakenly assumed victory was in the bag before the last pitch.
An hour later, I was running for my room with the taunts of Mets fans ringing in my ears; New York had come back to win the game and series, of course, and when I opened my door the next morning it was covered with streamers and front-page headlines from the Times, Daily News, and Post. Wendy and I didn't last much past Christmas break, and I would have to wait nearly 20 years for my revenge over Gotham.
On Oct. 20, 2004, only after the final out of the '04 ALCS, did I tell my wife it was OK to get the camera and shoot...
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