Child Abuse?

I was born and raised in Belleville, IL. I love sports. In particular, I love baseball. Of all the strange things to remember from my youth, I remember getting ready for school the day after the Cardinals won the 1982 World Series and the radio around our house blasting “Celebration.” I remember waiting to go to a Cub Scout meeting and watching Ozzie’s homerun over the right field wall in the 1985 playoffs. I remember my barber getting me Whitey Herzog’s autograph on a Cardinal hat that I dropped in the creek two days later. I don’t know why I remember these tidbits. I also don’t understand that after all I know about the Cardinals, and after all of the games I watch, and after all of the big moments that were fixtures of my childhood why I became

*gulp*

A Cubs fan.

I have my suspicions. During the sweltering hot days that a St Louis summer can provide I would often stay inside and play with my baseball cards. I would arrange them in alphabetical order, numerical order, team order, etc. I was addicted to these things. While doing this, I would search the TV channels for something to watch and would frequently stop on a channel that was broadcasting a live-action version of what I was carefully placing in my baseball card binders: WGN.

This was back in 1988 when the Cubs had a division winning team featuring guys like Ryne Sandberg, Andre Dawson, Mark Grace, Rick Sutcliffe, Shawon Dunston, and so on. It was a great team and a lot of fun to watch. But the thing that got me most wasn’t as much the team as it was this insane guy in the broadcast booth mispronouncing everyone’s name and singing during the 7th inning stretch.

Harry Caray

I know St Louis had him first and that he did his best broadcasting with the Cardinals, but his enthusiasm and his love for the Cubs was unmatched. He made me fall in love with them. Now, being as young as I was, I had no grasp on history nor did I have a magic 8 ball to predict what the future held for this team. Had I known then what I know now, I might have made a different decision, but as a kid, you don’t think about the future. You think about the now, and as of right then and there, I was hooked on the Cubs.

Still am.

Now here’s my problem. Outside of my father and I, there aren’t going to be many Cub fans in my son’s life. As I grew up right across the river from greats like Ozzie Smith and Willie McGee, my son will be right across the river from greats like Albert Pujols and Matt Holliday. His friends will love the Cardinals. His relatives already do love the Cardinals. Do I push him to like the team that my father and I love so much or do I let him make his own decision and just be glad that he’s taking an interest in the sport that means so much to me?
The funny thing is, I made my decision the second I found out I was having a boy. After Carol and I left the doctor’s office, I came right back to work and got on the internet. A few weeks later, UPS delivered a package to our house. Inside that package was a child’s mobile to hang above his crib. If you wound it up, you would see four little bears in blue hats spinning around to the melodious sound of Take Me Out to the Ballgame.

Sorry buddy. You’ll work this out in therapy.