November 2002

My name is Rodrigo Monroy, I am from Mexico City and I have to say I am a diehard Red Sox fan.

When I was 7 the 1986 World Series was taking place and everybody in my family (a baseball family) was rooting for the Sox but I thought it would be a good idea to be on the other side and root for the Mets. The morning after game six everybody was talking about it and I was glad the Mets won. Later they won the last game and I was really happy because I chose the winning team.

Two years later the Sox went to the ALCS and I saw they were a charismatic team full of energy. Wade Boggs and Roger Clemens were my heroes so I went to the store and bought two posters of them. Since that year everything began to change in my mind between the Sox and me, I understand THE RED SOX WAY OF LIFE, hating the Yankees and having patience.

My father, a Yankees diehard fan, tried to make me a fan of the New York team but I never wanted to (don’t know if it was because I was a rebel boy or because fate wanted me rooting the Sox, I think it was the second), but as you could imagine every time the Sox play a series against them I fight and discuss a lot with him.

Three and a half years ago I meet Diana, my girlfriend and future wife. We are in a relationship since May of 1999. She couldn’t understand why I was so interested in just baseball games in October (ALCS Vs. Yankees). She was not understanding of what was happening, why I was mad when losing and happy when Pedro won the only game at Fenway Park. She thought I was totally insane because I changed my mood with things out of my control.

The next year she began to understand a little about the Sox and tried to make an effort just for me, watching some games and hearing my amazing stories of the 1975 Carlton Fisk home run and the tragedy of Bill Buckner’s error. She was now calling Pedro “Pedrito,” as if he was a friend, and she knew about Nomar, Manny, Ted and Yaz. (Just excellent for her first lesson). That 2000 season was just perfect to teach her elementary baseball things and elementary Sox things.

That season she came and asked me how she could became a Sox fan just like me. I didn't know what to tell her. It was a hard question. Maybe you became a fan when you care about the team and when you suffer about them and you win and lose with them. I told her that but she didn’t understand.

For the 2001 summer we went to San Diego for vacation and one day at the mall she bought a blue cap with a red “B”. I was so happy I was just about to cry, my girlfriend was buying a Red Sox cap. (For the next year and a half she bought 4 more caps.)

I couldn’t believe what was happening! It was kind of magical, my non-baseball girlfriend was converting into a Red Sox fan and a baseball fan. In 2001 she also bought a Red Sox home jersey, and from that moment I really understood everything was just changing and I was the happiest man on earth.

I saw the Yankees Vs. Diamondbacks World Series games that season with my girlfriend (never before had the idea crossed my mind and never before I thought it could be real, but it was happening). We both were crying when Soriano hit that home run in game seven and the Diamondbacks were losing, but I have to admit she was maybe the happiest woman in the world when Luis Gonzalez connected for a single and the Yankees lost. She was jumping all around the house, laughing and dancing. It was great to see her doing that. I think I was happier to see her doing that than to see the Yankees lose.

For the 2002 season I bought the Red Sox Monopoly game and it is really funny to play with her, she always chooses the pitcher token and she is always trying to buy Ted Williams before me and gets mad if I buy Jim Rice, because she says that property is not mine, the red color properties are for her.

Right now she is reading Stephen King’s book: “The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon” and she can understand when it says something about Fenway Park, Jason Varitek, Nomar or even Tom Gordon.

Just to make you all understand her love for the Red Sox, the other day I asked her what would happen if we broke up and her next boyfriend were a diehard Yankees fan, will she root for the Yankees? She just laughed and told me she could never do that because she is now a Red Sox fan.

Now she is always telling me we need to save some money because she really wants to go to Boston to see the Sox play (because we have never been there before) and walk around the city.

I think she knows now what is to be a Red Sox fan. She knows about the magic of Fenway Park, the tragedy of Bill Buckner, the curse of Ruth, the problem with Roger Clemens, and she also understands what it's like to get mad watching Jeter play or getting mad just watching someone with a blue NY cap. She understands many things but I am sure she really understands what the word hope means. The next year it will be.

January 2005

In September 2003 she went to Vancouver and one day she was wearing her Red Sox cap and someone from the other side of the block saw her with the cap and shouted “Let's go Red Sox!” She came back to Mexico saying that man helped her to see how it is to be a fan and how good it feels to be one of them. She couldn't believe someone in Canada was rooting for a U.S. professional team with a Mexican girl wearing a cap on vacation.

I just told her that Red Sox fans are everywhere and the team is not a regular team, it is a team like no other because of their history, curse….etc etc etc.

For the 2003 season she was a real fan. We saw the post season games together against Oakland and she was really very excited.

For the games against the Yankees in the ALCS she was really another person from when we began our relationship. She was now a real fan. For the seventh game we went to my parents house to see the game, both wearing our jerseys and my mother a T-shirt that I borrowed for her.

Everything was fine and we were very happy until the eight inning, when we were almost ready to leave for a bar with our jerseys and have some beers and celebrate……………

Then what happened none of us were expecting to happen: Boone´s home run. As you can imagine both of us were almost crying. I took her to her home and we both were silent in the car when suddenly she turned to me and said, “I hate you, my life was great and calm until I became a Red Sox fan. What did you do to me?” I just laughed and hugged her.

For 2004 she was ready for a new season, happy and saying “This is the year.” We saw a lot of games together and it was very easy to take her to a bar to see a game.

Last September we broke up and it was very sad for me, my Red Sox fan girlfriend and future wife was leaving.

Our dream to see a Sox game in Boston together and have a daughter with a pink jersey suddenly disappeared. My dream to give her a wedding ring at Fenway Park also disappeared. Everything disappeared and it is hard to imagine a new girlfriend rooting for the Sox. I just hope there is someone that can understand me again.

The ALCS of 2004 began and I was worried because no one cared about the Sox besides my mother. I invited some friends to my house to see the first game when I received an e-mail from one of them saying, “Rodrigo, I will go to your house but let me tell you I am a Yankees fan”……..suddenly another friend (a friend that likes soccer and does not even understand about baseball) replied to the e-mail and said “We do not care if you are a Yankee fan because from now on I will be a Red Sox fan.”

I just laughed, thinking it was just to bother the other guy. When he arrived to my house he turned to me and said “Where is my jersey, or do you expect me to be a fan not wearing anything?” I gave him the road jersey and a cap, he took them to his house and every day there was a game he was wearing them.

For game six we went together to a sports bar and he was very happy and excited about it. It was incredible to be watching the game with someone that was not even a baseball fan.

For game seven we went with a lot of friends to the same bar and there was my uncle´s boss, a 55-year old man, another diehard Red Sox fan. I thought I was the only one in Mexico City, but I was very happy I was wrong.

In the last inning my friends began telling me it was not the “Ruth” curse that affected the Sox, it was Diana´s (my ex-girlfriend) curse and when I broke up the curse was over.

In the moment the Sox won my cell phone rang and I saw it was a call from my parents house and I picked up the phone and said “Mom, what a game……we won, we are going to the World Series!” When I heard my father´s voice saying “I am not your mother, congratulations son, I hope this is really the year,” I really felt very nice about the call from him because he is a Yankee fan but admitted the Sox made magic and a miracle comeback.

I saw the World Series always in company and the last game I came to my parents place because my mother has always supported me. When game four finished my cell phone began to rang. Everybody was calling me because they knew I was a diehard Red Sox fan with the team in the top or the bottom.

Suddenly my cell began to rang with a different tone, It was Diana (my ex-gf) calling me for the first time since we broke up. When I picked up the phone she began saying to me “I'm so glad about this, it is incredible……..I saw all the games since they were playing against the Yankees and I do not have anyone to share this moment with so I called you.”

I really never expected her call but that is when I understood the power of a team, what a bunch of “idiots” can do in other people´s life. She was a real fan and she proved it by calling me…………she also proved it when we went to dinner the day we broke up because she began saying “Please tell me what is happening in baseball, I'm lost.”

Today my life is very different, I am still waiting to meet a girl that shows interest in learning about the Red Sox. My friend that became a fan bought his jersey and a cap and we are planning a trip to Boston next September to see some games against the A´s. We also bought 4 “Red Sox Nation” wristbands because we said we are going to wear 2 of them and when we finally meet the right girl we are going to give them the other 2, just like a wedding ring.

This is my love and baseball story with a happy ending………RED SOX CHAMPIONS!!!!! “This is the year…………..again!”

If any Mexican fan or Red Sox fan wants to write me, my e-mail is roymonroy@yahoo.com