I was there when...

I was in NYC this past weekend for a wedding. The wedding was fun. I didn't know the bride (her name was My) or the groom (his name was Mo), but Amy did, so we went. It was a very interesting mix of Asian and Arabic traditions (including belly dancers and no actual ceremony to sit through.) It was nice.

One night while we were there, we were having dinner with Dawn, my godmother, and we started playing the 'I Was There When' game. You know, 'I was there when Gretzky and Messier were both playing on the Rangers at the same time and played against Dominik Hasek.' (I really was there, by the way, at the Gardens. The game ended in a 1-1 tie and proved, to me, that Hasek was just as great as Gretzky.) Dawn had a lot more "I was there's," but then she brought up game 7 between the Yankees and the Red Sox in 2003. I was there.

I had just moved in with Dawn in NYC. There was a lot going on behind the scenes with the Yankees and Red Sox that year...a lot more drama than normal. There had been that fight where Pedro Martinez showed what a jerk he is. Dawn decided to take me to the game, even though she took me to the one the night before (the Yankees lost that one) and she had all her friends calling and offering her tons of money for this ticket. Through most of the game the Sox were up, and I had to convince myself that it was OK if the Yankees lost. It meant that they would't go to the World Series, and Boston would, but the Cubs still had a chance to make it to the World Series, and if they made it, I wanted them to win (yes, even over the Yankees), so I thought maybe God was letting the Sox win so the Cubs could eventually win the World Series. The other die hard Yankees fans with season tickets around me didn't really see it that way. Around the 8th inning they were doing everything they could to get the Yankees to win. Dawn had eaten the peanuts she had to eat at every game. The guy in front of her, Gino, was rocking back and forth so hard I thought he'd fall out of his seat and end up right on home plate. The game was tied 5-5 going into the 9th. And all through the 9th. Then going into the 10th. And the 11th. I was tired. (Yes, this is about me. I'm sure the players were tired, too, but they could have ended the game a million times before the 11th inning). And hungry and thirsty, but I couldn't leave my seat. And I had to go to the bathroom. And I had been on my feet since the 8th inning. Aaron Boone, who hadn't done anything all year except miss grounders, drop pop-ups, and strike out, came up. I was about to sit down, when all the sudden I saw the ball fly up to about our level (Dawn's seats are in the 2nd tier). The next few minutes are kinda a blur, but I remember screaming, and jumping (how safe is that, really? All those people jumping up and down in a stadium that's falling apart to begin with?) and hugging Gino and Dawn and everyone else around me. And then Todd, Dawn's friend with seats 4 rows down and 1 section over, was in front of us, screaming and jumping. I have no idea how he got there. He must have climbed over people, or under people, I guess. I missed Boone running around the bases, but I saw the whole team run out and jump on him when he got back to home plate. It was so cool. And I can say, "I was there when Aaron Boone hit a home run to beat the Red Sox in game 7."