Red Sox, Gators, Bruins and Patriots - but in which order?

*Edit: Dad swears he was never a Whalers fan, nor did he raise me as one. I don't know why I remember so vividly attending Whalers games and having all sorts of Whalers gear and being sad when they moved to North Carolina, but then again, I was in 7th grade when that happened so maybe I'm making up a childhood for myself here. Very possible with Graves' brain...

Everyone always asks me which teams I root for. I was born and raised in Massachusetts, but my dad was born in New York, spent a few years in Amsterdam, New York and then many more in Enfield, Connecticut. Although Enfield is on the border of Massachusetts, Connecticut hasn't had a professional sports team since the Whalers packed up and became the Carolina Hurricanes in 1997 (breaking all of our hearts, by the way). So most Connecticut residents root for either New York or Boston teams - and seem to be pretty evenly split. Rhode Island is surprisingly similar even though most people consider Rhode Island part of Massachusetts, and the Red Sox Triple-A team is in Pawtucket.

What I'm getting that is that I was raised a Yankees, Giants and Whalers fan. My family never cared about professional basketball, but we were pretty obsessed with UConn, especially during the 35-0 Rebecca Lobo season.

It wasn't until college that I got sick of being the lonely only Yankees fan. The 2003 ALCS was what did it for me. I was a sophomore in college and had been around Bostonians for the past year at my small state school, and I finally got the itch to switch teams. The Yankees won the series and I had to save face, but inside I felt so left out of the riot that the students had when we lost to the Yankees (notice I'm already saying "we" here). It wasn't a riot I condoned, but we were rowdy college kids and that's what you do when a Boston teams loses. Or wins. You riot. Students flipped a campus police car. I went to watch for a little bit but everyone knew I was a Yankees fan so I didn't stay and I certainly didn't partake in the mayhem.

That winter and spring, I became good friends with one of my co-workers at Target who was a diehard Red Sox fan from Enfield. He made it his life's mission to convert me. For Christmas, he gave me the ugliest, manliest (literally - it was a men's) Red Sox hat. But he was really trying. I liked him, so I let him win. I traded in my pink Yankees gear for non-pink Red Sox attire.

And boy was I rewarded. As we know, the Sox reversed the curse and won it all the following season.

Most days, I forget I was ever a Red Sox fan. My mom never really cared about the Yankees, but became a more loyal Red Sox fan in the late 90s or early 2000s. My brother could care less but liked identifying with my dad, so we were a house divided for many years.

When I moved to Florida in 2007, I had no idea how ingrained in the Gator Nation I would become. I didn't get season tickets to the games (first-year students almost never do), but I managed to procure tickets to every home game thanks to a sweet part-time gig with StubHub and a best friend who worked in the UFAA ticket office. The Sox made it to the ALDS and swept the Angels on my 23rd birthday, the day after a very rough Gators loss to LSU. I remember watching the World Series with my then-boyfriend, who had become a temporary bandwagon fan (only because of me) and was a huge Josh Beckett fan. We didn't do anything special for Game 4 of the sweep but sit on his couch and watch the game with no fingernails left at the end. Everyone congratulated me (my nickname in Florida was "Boston" because no one down there knows anything else about the state of Massachusetts) for a week straight, and I proudly wore my Schilling jersey everywhere, but nowhere as proudly as on Halloween a few days later when I dumped a bottle of red nail polish onto my sock.

I took this on my walk into work this morning.
2013 ALCS Champions!

To answer the question of what teams I root for, I struggle every year with my order of preference. After last year's dismal season, I went into this season saying 1. Bruins 2. Gators 3. Red Sox 4. Patriots. That preference only means if all four of those teams were playing in some championship game at the same exact time, which would I watch/go to. But this year, the Gators are sucking and the Bruins season has only just begun, so you can safely assume my order is more like 1. Red Sox 2. Bruins 3. Patriots 4. Gators.

On that note, I am available Wednesday and Thursday evenings if you would like to take me to Games 1 or 2 of the 2013 World Series. My office is approximately 450 yards from Fenway Park and I know of a great place to get a drink and a burger before the game that only the locals know about. Call me.

Just a clean freak, not suicidal

Every time I clean and purge my office/desk at work, I always wonder if people are assuming the worst. This is because when I was in high school, I would eventually get sick of my locker being full of papers and other crap that made it messy, so I’d clean it out and usually ended up bringing home clothes, gym sneakers, and other things that had just been piling up. One time, I guess I had been having a bad week and so when I cleaned out my locker, the next day I was called down to my guidance counselor’s office. I don’t remember the conversation anymore (it’s been 11+ years), but she basically asked if I was going to kill myself. Ummm...what?! No! Of course not! Why would you ask me that? She said my friends were concerned that I had cleaned out my locker and took a lot of things home, and they had informed her that they thought I might be planning suicide. I immediately knew which friends she was referring to, and I was furious with them for crying wolf when they knew full well I was just down in the dumps, not suicidal.

I think we had all been reading too much “Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul.” Remember those books? I think they specifically recalled the story of Kyle, which I’m sharing below from an untrustworthy source, so who knows if this is even how it goes.

One Day – Story
One day, when I was a freshman in high school, I saw a kid from my class was walking home from school. His name was Kyle. It looked like he was carrying all of his books. I thought to myself, “Why would anyone bring home all his books on a Friday? He must really be a nerd.”

I had quite a weekend planned (parties and a football game with my friend tomorrow afternoon), so I shrugged my shoulders and went on. As I was walking, I saw a bunch of kids running toward him. They ran at him, knocking all his books out of his arms and tripping him so he landed in the dirt. His glasses went flying, and I saw them land in the grass about ten feet from him. He looked up and I saw this terrible sadness in his eyes. My heart went out to him. So, I jogged over to him and as he crawled around looking for his glasses, and I saw a tear in his eye.

As I handed him his glasses, I said, “Those guys are jerks. They really should get lives.” He looked at me and said, “Hey thanks!” There was a big smile on his face. It was one of those smiles that showed real gratitude. I helped him pick up his books, and asked him where he lived. As it turned out, he lived near me, so I asked him why I had never seen him before. He said he had gone to private school before now. I would have never hung out with a private school kid before. We talked all the way home, and I carried his books. He turned out to be a pretty cool kid. I asked him if he wanted to play football on Saturday with my friends and me. He said yes. We hung all weekend and the more I got to know Kyle, the more I liked him. And my friends thought the same of him.

Monday morning came, and there was Kyle with the huge stack of books again. I stopped him and said, “Boy, you are gonna really build some serious muscles with this pile of books everyday!” He just laughed and handed me half the books.

Over the next four years, Kyle and I became best friends. When we were seniors, began to think about college. Kyle decided on Georgetown, and I was going to Duke. I knew that we would always be friends, that the miles would never be a problem. He was going to be a doctor, and I was going for business on a football scholarship.

Kyle was valedictorian of our class. I teased him all the time about being a nerd. He had to prepare a speech for graduation. I was so glad it wasn’t me having to get up there and speak.
Graduation day, I saw Kyle. He looked great. He was one of those guys that really found himself during high school. He filled out and actually looked good in glasses. He had more dates than me and all the girls loved him! Boy, sometimes I was jealous. Today was one of those days.

I could see that he was nervous about his speech. So, I smacked him on the back and said, “Hey, big guy, you’ll be great!” He looked at me with one of those looks (the really grateful one) and smiled.

“Thanks,” he said. As he started his speech, he cleared his throat, and began. “Graduation is a time to thank those who helped you make it through those tough years. Your parents, your teachers, your siblings, maybe a coach… but mostly your friends. I am here to tell all of you that being a friend to someone is the best gift you can give them. I am going to tell you a story.”
I just looked at my friend with disbelief as he told the story of the first day we met. He had planned to kill himself over the weekend. He talked of how he had cleaned out his locker so his Mom wouldn’t have to do it later and was carrying his stuff home. He looked hard at me and gave me a little smile.

“Thankfully, I was saved. My friend saved me from doing the unspeakable.” I heard the gasp go through the crowd as this handsome, popular boy told us all about his weakest moment. I saw his Mom and Dad looking at me and smiling that same grateful smile. Not until that moment did I realize its depth.

Never underestimate the power of your actions. With one small gesture you can change a person’s life. For better or for worse.

It's a nice story, and still gives me chills. But that wasn't at all the case with me, and I didn't at all appreciate my friends' concerns because they were unfounded. I eventually forgave them and realized they were actually looking out for me, and maybe also trying to create a bit of drama at my expense, but I still think about every time I do a deep clean and purge of my desk or even my place. Awkward!