I actually don’t remember attending my first Cubs game. I was too young. In fact I was taken to so many games from a very young age, I suppose I have a casserole of memories from dozens of trips to the ballpark before I was even five years old.

I’ve had countless Cubs heroes over the years. Keith Moreland was the reason I wore the number 6 whenever I played a sport. But I suppose it had to be Dave Kingman who was probably my first true Cubs hero. He spent just three seasons in Chicago, 1977, ’78, and ’79. But in 1978 he hit 48 home runs as a Cub. That’s as good a reason as any for a kid to chose an idol. He once hit a ball out of Wrigley Field so hard and so far that it broke a window on one of the apartment buildings across the street. I recount this story regularly, usually inserting myself into the stands as I do so. But I can’t say with certainty that I was there for that one.

I was, however, in attendance with my father for game two of the 1984 playoff series against the San Diego Padres. We had improbably won tickets on WGN radio the night before. So the next day my dad took me out of school early, and we went to the ball game. If you’re familiar with the image of Steve Bartman from the 2003 playoffs, then based on the stone-faced kid in photograph below, you might understand why I will always empathize with him, and will forever say that were I in his seat that night in 2003, I would have done just what he did. The kid in this photograph is me. But I’m willing to bet that Bartman has a similar photo at that age.

My memories of game two of that ’84 playoff series are significant, of course, having been in attendance, but I actually remember the day before even better. As you might imagine, the buzz around Chicago was insane. This was the first playoff appearance for the Cubs since 1945, nearly 40 years. I was ten years old and in Mrs. Colodny’s fifth grade classroom at Chicago’s Peterson Elementary School in our Albany Park neighborhood. I was angry with her that day because there were other teachers who brought televisions into their classrooms to allow students to watch the game. Mrs. Colodny didn’t seem to have the same reverence for the situation as I or those other teachers did. I watched the clock that day even more closely than I had watched the NL East standings all season long. To make matters worse, I was a member of the school crossing guard and my obligation to safety would prolong the agony endured before I could run home to see the game. I only lived four measly houses away from the school, too. I finally got home having already caught wind that the Cubs had a huge lead in the game. They won 13-0 and things looked and felt good for the series. Then my dad and I went to game two and watched them win 4-2 behind a strong pitching performance from Steve Trout. Back then the playoffs were only a 5-game series. The Cubs famously lost the following three games in excruciating fashion.

That was when I learned how hard life could be for Cub fans.

There is one thing you need to know about my decision to apply to be a crossing guard. It had nothing to do with my concern for others, or a need to make sure students successfully navigated our neighborhood crosswalks, nor anything to do with the promotion of safety. Nope, it was because once a year all members of the school crossing guard were taken to a Cubs game. Having been to the ballpark so many times with my family, I felt like I was the one in charge of that field trip. Except I simply didn’t have time to guide anyone as we wandered into my world. I had my own agenda to tend to. I would always make sure to have saved up at least a couple bucks so I could buy a scorecard and pencil, and hopefully a Pepsi or two. I was mostly oblivious to the conversations of my classmates around me. I ignored their roughhousing and their teases and taunts. I had to make sure not to miss a pitch, let alone an at-bat. My mom and dad were counting on me (at least that’s what I told myself) to bring home a flawless card, so that they might know exactly what had happened in that game.

Of course it would have been silly to expect that my mother would miss a pitch herself. In the years of my childhood where she would stay at home, often mixing the usual household chores with a seemingly never ending load of freelance work in a time when freelance proofreaders and editors were not just a foreign idea to me, but to most of the world, she somehow managed to coordinate her daily routine around the Cubs’ first pitch.

Harry Carey’s voice was the ubiquitous soundtrack to the summers of my youth. If the Cubs were playing that afternoon, the TV was tuned to WGN. Even on days when the lure of my friends playing outside was too much to stay inside, I always kept an ear out for the sound of my mother’s exuberant clapping, hoping to hear it echo from the open front windows of our apartment. Those claps meant the Cubs had just done something wonderful. I was in love back then, as I still am today, with the sound of her voice as she would yell, “Al-right!” or a simple, “Yes!” to accompany those hand claps that signaled Cubby success halfway down the block. It might have meant that Bobby Murcer scored from third base on a Manny Trillo groundout to second, bringing the Cubs within six runs of the lead; or it might have been a bottom-of-the-ninth Kingman home run to win the ball game. Regardless, her enthusiasm remained equal.

This was the ritual of my summer days. There were no lights in Wrigley Field until 1988. So afternoon after afternoon would revolve around the games. On more than one occasion I found myself sitting at home in front of the television as the game would just be starting when my dad would unexpectedly come home from work early. “Wanna go to the game?” he might ask with a smile. I wouldn’t even speak but would jump up, find my Cubs hat and my mitt, and be at the front door ready to go faster than a Rick Rueschel fastball. We’d hop on the el train and would usually be at Wrigley by the time the third inning was underway.

I’ve been to hundreds of baseball games at Wrigley Field. I used to say that I’ve been to at least a thousand, though that’s certainly an exaggeration. But whether I attended two games, or two thousand, the thrill of walking up that tunnel and seeing the field forever remains something I’ll never take for granted. It’s probably my favorite experience. That fact has never, ever waned. Ever. It’s one of the single greatest feelings I can think of. I’ve never had children, and it might be best that I never do, because even the joy of their arrival would be hard-pressed to compete with that feeling of being bombarded by the sights and smells of Wrigley Field.

My grandfather is the basis for this religion. He and my grandmother were church goers, but to me it was the Cubs he seemed to worship more than anything else.

The regular trips to their house in Berwyn in the summertime always began the same way. We’d pull in the driveway, head inside the house and upstairs to greet my grandmother with the requisite kisses and hugs, then I’d immediately pull away to run downstairs, into my grandfather’s domain. He’d be seated in his recliner, his feet up, the mug full of Old Style to his left, the John LeCarre, Robert Parker, or perhaps P.D. James mystery novel he’d be currently reading would either be open in his hands, resting on his lap, or set to the side next to his Old Style. The position of the book was dictated by the state of the Cubs game.

I’d come running in and he’d lower his recliner, rise to his feet with the power and agility of a man who spent much of his life climbing up and down ladders (he was a painting contractor for much of his life), and he’d greet me with a very firm handshake and a crushing rub of the shoulder or tussle of the hair. He was passionate about his Cubs. And they were most definitely his Cubs. But he had no problem sharing them with me. I dare say he even gave them to me.

My grandfather was born on September 28, 1908 — 16 days later the Chicago Cubs won the World Series for the second year in a row. As it turned out, they wouldn’t win it again for 108 years. My grandfather passed away in November of 1989, when I was 15 years old. The Cubs went to the playoffs that year but lost the seven-game series in five games to the San Francisco Giants. My dad and I share the belief that it was the Cubs that kept my grandfather alive toward the end. We had managed to purchase tickets for the first game of that playoff series, and one of them was earmarked for my grandfather. But he declined to attend with us. This is when we knew how badly the cancer had wrecked him. This is a man who broke two ribs the morning of Superbowl XX when the Bears decimated the Patriots but didn’t tell anyone until the game was over and done with, so for him to feel too weak to attend a Cubs game was particularly telling. He was dead just over a month after it ended.

Even now, 28 years after his passing, I still think about him almost every time I watch a game. I have countless Chicago Cubs artifacts displayed on shelves and walls in my apartment, some of which were his. When I was eight or nine years old, my mother helped me make him a bookmark (pictured right). It was made of felt, with a hand-cut Cubs logo glued onto it, with yarn braided from the top. He was always a voracious reader, and from the time he received that bookmark until he died, it was always nestled snugly into whatever book he was reading. When he passed away, that bookmark returned to me. I’ve had it displayed proudly on my own baseball shelf for years. But when the 2016 playoffs began, I carried it as a charm. If I was at work while the game was on, it was tucked carefully into my pants pocket. For the games I was able to watch, I usually had it clutched firmly in my hand. But for every pitch, every hit, and every out of last season’s championship run it remained with me.

I’ve often said that the Cubs have made me cry more often than any injury I’ve experienced, physical or emotional. They’ve brought me to tears with more frequency than the combination of all the heartbreak I’ve felt at the hands of girlfriends lost. No amount of bullying suffered or athletic embarrassment publicly endured has caused me more heartache than what I’ve felt over the years as a Cubs fan. And while there is a bit of hyperbole in those statements, they’re statements based in truth. However, I’ve long forgotten the anguish of most trifles I experienced as a young boy, prepubescent teen, awkward teenager, bumbling young man, or floundering adult. But I’ll never forget sitting on the living room floor after the Cubs lost game five of the ’84 playoffs, crying.

The Cubs brought me tears of anguish even as recently as 2003. In Game 6 of the NLCS that year, they were just five infamous outs away from their first World Series appearance since 1945, before they inexplicably handed the game to the Florida Marlins. The following night they again failed to hold the lead in Game 7, and as a 29-year-old man, I had to leave our local bar in an attempt to walk off the sting of the loss.

I walked around the block, turned into the alley, the misery leaking from my eye sockets. When I looked up I saw a figure approaching me. It was an acquaintance from the bar. We approached one another. No words were exchanged, but the look on his face and his tear-stained cheeks said it all. We stopped as if to speak, but neither of us really had the fortitude to muster any sort of language. I believe there was a brief embrace, then we both continued trudging onward in opposite directions. It would prove to be a long winter.

The only thing I have ever consistently wanted in my entire life was for the Chicago Cubs to win the World Series. I’d imagined it every single year, beginning from when I can first remember remembering things. I would imagine where I might be when it happened. Of course, I usually envisioned myself in the stands. Without question, I knew tears would make an appearance. For once they would be tears of joy.

I already mentioned that I grew up in Chicago proper. To be precise, I grew up 5.1 miles from Wrigley Field. Less than that, as the crow flies. The CTA’s Brown Line could deliver us just south of the ballpark in 14 minutes. We eventually moved to the near-north suburb of Skokie where I went to high school. From our house there it was 8.6 miles to Wrigley Field by car. But we also had immediate access to the Skokie Swift, the CTA’s yellow line that would connect suburb dwellers to the Howard Street el stop in something like eight minutes. In other words, I was never very far from the ballpark. I went to college in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, but returned home every summer. So I never missed a season. I went to at least one Cub game every year for at least 35 years, but usually closer to a dozen games.

Not terribly long ago, I moved back to Cedar Rapids on a more permanent basis. I moved here in the summer of 2011, and remain here still. At first I made it back to Chicago for a game or two in the couple years that followed. But then it happened: I went an entire season without making a pilgrimage to the only church of which I considered myself a member. I was mildly devastated by this fact, but as a man in his late-30s I decided I shouldn’t let it bother me. But it did. Then I missed another season. And then another. This had crossed the border of unacceptable, and was blatantly trespassing on unforgivable.

By this time the Ricketts family had already purchased the club and they had brought in Theo Epstein (the man responsible for ending the “curse” endured by the Boston Red Sox for so many years) to help run the show. The direction of this franchise was clearly making a turn in the right direction. Major renovations were being done to Wrigley Field. Purists hated what it was doing to their ballpark. While I do consider myself a baseball purist, when it came to Wrigley Field I was a huge proponent of change. I was one of the few who began to argue long, long ago that the Cubs could never compete while playing in Wrigley in the state it had been in for so long. I welcomed the renovations.

Several years ago my sister and I treated our parents to the Wrigley Field tour experience. We saw the inside of the Cubs’ clubhouse. We saw the state of the facilities they had to endure every single home game 81 times every single season. The clubhouse was smaller than my one-bedroom apartment in an era when newer ballparks featured amenities that more closely resembled an airplane hanger. It was no wonder the Cubs faltered late in so many seasons. So when it was announced that major multi-million-dollar renovations would begin, starting with the clubhouse, I celebrated.

At the end of the 2015 season, the Cubs held so much promise that I decided to make myself a promise that I’d get to at least one game in 2016. So come the next season (last year) I watched as many games as my local cable provider aired, which was a relatively significant number, thankfully. But I almost didn’t make it back for a game. Finally I was able to get away and return home for the final regular season home game. It was against the Cardinals and it was a doozy.

I went alone and walked up to the ticket window asking for the best available seat. I expected the woman on the other side of the glass to laugh at me at the prospect of getting my hands on a ticket at such short notice, but I also knew that they often release unused seats shortly before game time. This secret had landed my friends and me some prime seats in years past. This time was no different. I was offered a seat four rows from the field behind home plate and looking right down the first base line. I paid a little more than $200 for the seat, but it was worth every single goddamn penny.

Of course, I kept score at the game. I took iPhone pictures of every player as they strode into the on deck circle just some 20 feet away from me. I felt like a tourist in my own city, but I didn’t care. I snapped pictures of owner Tom Ricketts who was seated even closer. I got teary eyed as a video montage dedicated to retiring catcher David Ross played on the giant HD video screen in left field. Then got teary eyed again when David Ross hit his 10th homer of the season to give the Cubs the first run and first lead of the game, resulting in one of the most incredible curtain calls I’d ever seen. The Cubs won that night, their 99th of the season, and the most in a season since 1935. (They would end the season with 103 wins.) It was also their franchise record 57th home win of the season. John Lester earned the victory, his league leading 19th win at the time. It was an amazing feeling being back there. It was an amazing feeling being home.

As memorable as that game was, it has some pretty amazing company in the list of memorable games I was lucky to attend. Here are a few, just to give some examples.

• June 3, 2003: The Tampa Bay Devil Rays were in town when Sammy Sosa broke his bat on an ordinary ground out, exposing a barrel full of cork. To this day, this event taints Sosa’s legacy as one of the greatest hitters of his generation. As the umpires conferred on the field I knew almost immediately what was happening. I also immediately recognized the long term ramifications this held for him. I’ll never forget shaking my head and speaking aloud to no one, “Oh, Sammy. No. No. No, Sammy.”

https://youtu.be/WrXVdwIGfuI

• May 16, 2000: As you may know, the bullpens at Wrigley Field are situated directly against the stands (although that will change this year [2017]). I was at the game against the Los Angeles Dodgers when a fan ran down to the Dodger bullpen, stole the hat off the head of backup catcher Chad Kreuter, punching him in the back of the head at the same time. You can imagine how that didn’t sit well with the players, and Krueter and several Dodger pitchers climbed into the stands as a fight broke out. My family’s seats that day happened to be directly behind the Dodger bullpen. We were probably 20 or 30 rows away, in the higher section, so we weren’t near the scrum, but we had great view of it all.

• September 12, 1998: In this game, Sammy Sosa belted his milestone 60th home run of the season. The game was against the Milwaukee Brewers and tuned out to be one of the best games I’d ever witnessed in person given all the different storylines in play that season. There was the epic battle between Sosa and Mark McGwire to eclipse Roger Maris’s single-season home run record. The Cubs were also firmly in the playoff hunt for the first time in nine years. As if that wasn’t enough, the Cubs were losing at one point 10-2, fought back only to be down 12-5 after 7 innings. They finally won the game on an Orlando Merced home run (ranked here as the 7th most important home run in Cubs history – granted, that ranking was made in 2008, but I’d surely still put it in the top 20). And that was just the game itself. What made it even more memorable was that my good pal Jay and I were the beneficiaries of the late-release ticket phenomenon. We went to the ballpark fully expecting to buy lousy and over-priced seats from a scalper, but instead checked at the box-office first. The next thing we knew we found ourselves seated in the ninth row behind the visitor’s dugout. But wait, it gets even better. Seated next to us were two random and friendly girls who happened to have previously worked at Wrigley as concession attendants, and therefore had access to free beer, which they happily shared with us. I seriously couldn’t make this up. Now that was heaven.

• June 7, 2003: Just four days after the Sammy Sosa corked-bat game, I was back at Wrigley when the New York Yankees came to Wrigley Field for the first time since Babe Ruth was still an active player. Kerry Wood was matched up against his childhood hero Roger Clemens. Not only was it an historic matchup of two historic teams, but Clemens was sitting on win number 299. None of us in attendance actually wanted to see that 300-win milestone happen, and thanks to a 3-run home run by Eric Karros in the bottom of the seventh inning and some clutch pitching from the Cub bullpen, we didn’t. The Cubs held on to win 5-2. It was also the only time I’d ever seen an ambulance brought onto a baseball field as Cubs first baseman Hee-seop Choi was knocked unconscious and concussed following a collision with Wood while both attempted to wrangle a sky-high popup. (Skip to the 15:00 mark on the YouTube video below to see the collision.) Karros came in to replace Choi, who despite being knocked out cold when his head hit the hard dirt of the third base line, held onto the ball.

• August 10, 1988: My high school friends and I made our way to Wrigley Field the day after the first official night game in Wrigley. But being that this game began at 4:00 pm, it didn’t take long for the lights to come on. So we were at the first Wrigley day game to see lights illuminate the field. It’s not exactly historic, but watching those lights flicker on in the gloamin’ was pretty damn cool.

• April 3, 2008: My dad and I got some nice seats just behind the Cubs’ bullpen for this matchup against the Brewers. We were just 10 feet away from Kerry Wood as he warmed up before entering the ballgame to record the first save of his career. He would end up with 63 saves for his career. The following year I would be in Kansas City when Kerry Wood would come in to close out a game for the Indians, a bittersweet moment.

• July 9, 1990: The Cubs and Wrigley Field played host to the All-Star game in 1990. While we were unable to get tickets to the game itself, my dad and I managed to get tickets to see the festivities the day before the game. It was the Home Run Derby, and it was probably the worst Home Run Derby of all time. Yet it did feature some of the most prolific home run hitters ever.

NATIONAL LEAGUE                       AMERICAN LEAGUE
Ryne Sandburg                                Mark McGwire
Darryl Strawberry                           Jose Canseco
Matt Williams                                  Ken Griffey Jr.
Bobby Bonilla                                   Cecil Fielder

You’d think by looking at that list of hitters that you would see some bombs. In fact, as it turned out, the wind was blowing in that day, and it was blowing in hard. For their careers, these eight guys hit a combined 3,276 home runs. On that day? They hit five (5). Five home runs. Of the American Leaguers, only McGwire went yard. Once. Matt Williams hit one on the NL side. And the man who had the fewest career home runs of any of them turned out to be the winner of the Derby, and also happened to be the hometown hero. Ryne Sandberg hit three homers in that exhibition for the victory. That All-Star game did feature 13 future Hall-of-Famers, however. Oh, and we also happened to be sitting a few rows behind Jose Canseco’s wife at the time. I daresay that the fans seated nearby focused more attention toward her than they did the players on the field.

So, yeah. I’ve been to a few special games on the North Side. Some remarkable for the feats performed on the field. Some remarkable for antics not even related to baseball. In fact, I happened to be in the stands with my family when Ozzy Osborne slurred his way through “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” one summer afternoon.

One last story I have to share is about the chilly afternoon in the very early 90s when two or three high school friends and I rode the Skokie Swift down to the ballpark. We had lousy seats somewhere along the third base line, pretty much out in left field. It was cold, and the stadium was only about a quarter full. We probably could have moved wherever we wanted, but we stayed pretty close to our ticketed seats. Somewhere around the seventh inning I noticed a fella wearing a hooded sweatshirt walk past us down the aisle with a younger kid. I just caught a glimpse of his face as he passed us, but I realized immediately it was Bill Murray. He selected a relatively abandoned row just about seven or eight rows in front of us. I told my friends that the guy sitting in front of us was Bill Murray. They didn’t believe me. I insisted, but still, they refused to believe me.

They refused, that is, until a line of autograph seekers began to form down that row, to the aisle and up the steps. I’m proud to say that we never moved from our seats. In fact I think we even yelled at the autograph seekers to “let him watch the game and sit the hell down.” To Bill Murray’s ever lasting credit, he signed autograph after autograph. When the end of the inning arrived he used that as an excuse to move on. There are very few people I’ve wanted to hang out with as much as I’ve wanted to hang with Bill Murray. That was the closest I’ve come.

I often think back to those days of my youth, when I didn’t have money problems, or woman problems, or anxiety problems, or depression issues, or issues with my career arc (or very noticeable lack thereof). Really, if I had any issues at all back then it didn’t extend much further than the acne on my face. But regardless of age, whenever I let myself fantasize about the day the Cubs would finally win it all, I always imagined that I would be successful in whatever career path I’d chosen. I sort of assumed that I’d be in the stadium when it happened, and naturally I’d be sitting next to Bill Murray, who would most certainly be my pal by then. I figured I would have kids to whom I’d have passed along my passion for the game and for the Cubbies. As it turned out, none of those things are the case.

And that’s just fine, honestly. Very few people actually live the life they’ve laid out for themselves at 10 or 13 or 16 or 20  or even 30 years old. But it wasn’t until the Cubs finally achieved the single thing I’ve wanted more than I’ve wanted anything else that it came crashing down on me.

It’s been nearly five months since Kris Bryant threw across the field to Anthony Rizzo to record the final out of their Championship season, and it’s taken me pretty much every minute of those months to finally wrap my head around the fact that my Cubs are the World Champs. Bill Murray’s Cubs. My Cubs. Harry Carey’s Cubs. My Cubs. Ernie Banks’ Cubs. My goddamn Cubs! But they are not mine. They’re everyone’s. And that’s what bugged me.

When the Cubs finally won game seven of the 2016 Series, I stood and cheered and cried. I wept. I wept for my mother and my father and my sister. I wept for my grandfather, for Harry Carey, Ernie Banks, and Ron Santo. But mostly I wept for myself.

It took a little while, but I realized that of the tears I shed that day, not all of them were out of joy, or relief, or memories of loved ones. A portion of those tears were out of anger. It was anger mixed with jealously. I actually felt angry that they could win the thing that I coveted more than anything else in the world, and they won it without me. I wasn’t even in Chicago when it happened. I felt like I deserved to be in the stadium in Cleveland. But I wasn’t. Even worse, I wasn’t in Chicago. I was overjoyed, but so very conflicted because I felt detached, almost exiled. It was juvenile and it was petty, but it was very, very real. It was a brutal feeling, but it was an honest feeling. It was a painful feeling.

It’s ridiculous. Positively ridiculous. It’s ridiculous that after a full lifetime of wanting this so badly I could be simultaneously overrun with coinciding feelings of exuberance and self-pity.

That night and in the days that followed, my phone blew up with calls and text-messages and emails congratulating me on the Cubs victory, as if I had something to do with it. I understand that these were well-wishers who had known how deeply blue my Cubs blood ran, and they were happy for me. I would reply with the obligatory response, usually expressing disbelief that it finally happened. But for every one of these messages I received, I became more agitated, and receded more and more into myself. I still didn’t understand why I felt this way. Where were these feelings of jealously and resentment coming from?

They had finally done it! The Cubs had found the Holy Grail and actually won the WorldmotherfuckingSeries, yet I sank further into a depression I didn’t understand. How could I feel so thoroughly unsatisfied?

Of the 42 years I’d lived on this Earth before the Cubs finally won it all last November, all but about 6 of those years were spent living in a proximity of no more than 9 miles away from Wrigley Field. Now here I was more than 250 miles away. I felt estranged from the team I loved. My move to Cedar Rapids was meant to be a temporary fix; a quick stop before I moved back to Chicago and back onto bigger and better things. Or if life took me to another city, it would be on the dime of success, so returning to Chicago to enjoy a run like this wouldn’t be a problem. I’d hop a flight and be where I needed to be.

But it didn’t work out that way. I made poor decisions, fell back into old bad habits, and let myself wallow in a rut carved from complacency. I wanted to blame some things on bad timing and poor luck, but for years I’d often shared one of my favorite quotes by the great baseball man Branch Rickey, “Luck is the residue of design.” So I accepted that any bad luck I’d encountered along the way was the result of my own doing. The responsibility for where I live is mine.

So here I was. Sequestered away from my Gotham, my Metropolis. The Cubs were making a run to be World Series champions while I watched from afar. And I knew they were going to do it, too. I’ll admit that there was a moment when they were down 3 games to 1 against Cleveland that I thought it wasn’t going to happen. At this point I hadn’t really recognized how deeply I was actually conflicted by all this. What I did know is that my stomach hurt constantly, I had a hard time sleeping, and all I could think about was whether I could afford to take a day off from work to watch the next game. Or if I could somehow afford to get home and see a game in person.

But then there was that night when my Cleveland friends were behaving particularly arrogant and cocky. They were quite content with their 3-1 lead and used the comfort of that lead to rub it into the faces of Cubs fans on social media outlets. As every Cubs fan already knew, and as my friends most certainly should have known, this would prove to be a huge mistake on their part.

However, it was shortly after being enraged by reading their words that I was suddenly hit with that proverbial sense of calm. I don’t know why, but from that moment forward I just knew that the Cubs were going to win this World Series. But at the same time, I knew better than to fall into this trap. I’d felt similar feelings before as a Cubs fan, and we all know how those situations turned out. Yet this was different. Of course, I didn’t dare share this feeling with anyone. No one. At all! No way. Somehow that would have undone my certainty. Even though this strange, confident, calm feeling never truly wavered, I also never ceased to feel completely sick with nervousness at every moment of each remaining game. It was an odd contradiction.

But these were still the Chicago Cubs, after all. Nutty was the norm.

Even when Cleveland outfielder Rajai Davis lined a home run off Aroldis Chapman in the bottom of the 9th inning to tie the game, I still somehow knew that the Cubs were going to win. In years past I would have been despondent at that turn of events. Inconsolable, even. This time, I simply put my head down and shook it a moment as I thought, “you’ve got to be kidding me.”

The calm remained. I actually grinned to myself while shaking my head. I grinned with the knowledge that they were going to do it. Again, the nervousness never went away, I’d been a Cub fan for too long not to anticipate the worst, or to think this would be easy, but I just fucking knew it was going to happen.

And it did.

But not before the game went into extra innings. And not before the baseball gods thought they’d be funny and make us all endure a 17-minute rain delay in the 10th inning. But the Cubs managed to get the lead again, and this time they held the lead. They won. They won the goddamn World Series. Screams of joy erupted from me as soon as Bryant released the ball. Tears followed close behind. I embraced friends and strangers. My cousin who lives in town appeared out of nowhere and I lunged at him and we embraced as I kept crying, thinking of our grandfather. The rest of that night is a haze.

It was when I woke up the next day that I realized I was in trouble. I should have been basking in the glow of this amazing victory. But it was the complete opposite. I didn’t want to face the world. I didn’t want people to congratulate me. I had to get up and go to work waiting tables like normal. I should’ve been walking on clouds, but it felt like I was mired in muck. Was it because I no longer had that one thing I’d always wanted? Was it because this long journey had come to a close?

No. It was because I didn’t feel fulfilled personally. The Cubs had won before I could.

The reason this was so hard for me to accept was because I was never prepared to accept it.

I wanted it. Certainly I wanted it as badly as I had ever wanted anything — right up to the end. But what do you do when the only thing you’ve ever wanted is suddenly given to you? What do you do when your wish is granted, but you’re not there to receive it?

A month-and-a-half later I took whatever money I had saved and spent it all on a road trip across the country. I traveled for four weeks. I traveled alone, stopping to visit and stay with a few friends along the way, but for a majority of time I was on the road, I was alone.

Toward the final days of my trip, I stayed with Todd in Arizona, a best friend who also happens to be a Cleveland native and one of the biggest Indians fans I’ve known. He also happened to be one of the friends who had angered me so much that late October night when so many in Cleveland took victory for granted. As we sat in his backyard enjoying the Arizona night, I attempted to explain all of this to him. This dilemma. This inner conflict. I felt I deserved this victory more than the rest of the Cubs fans celebrating worldwide. But everything I said made me sound spoiled and selfish.

It was about then that I realized the absurdity of it all. I still was still struggling to articulate what prevented me from truly enjoying everything. I just wasn’t able to pinpoint what was behind it, but I knew I had to stop harboring this apparent resentment. Because that’s not what it was all about.

Once I returned home from the road, I still fell deeper and deeper into a depression. It had ceased to be about the Cubs long ago, although I suspect I clung to that as some rational point in space and time that would allow me to pinpoint these feelings. It was only when I finally recognized that I’d never truly experienced success that I finally started to climb out of the darkness.

Seems backwards, right?

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve had plenty of minor victories in my life, and generally speaking I’ve excelled at most jobs I’ve held. But in the traditional sense of “success,” I’m miles and miles away from it. I’m a 43-year-old, never-married, single male, with no kids and no career to speak of. Honestly, it wouldn’t take a huge leap for me to consider myself a failure, if I wanted to. But I don’t.

And that’s when it occurred to me that when I laid awake at night as a kid I would wish and dream not for myself to make millions of dollars as a famous actor, athlete, or best selling author. Instead I would try to fall asleep to images of myself standing in a ballpark, surrounded by my friends and family, looking on tearfully as my Chicago Cubs, OUR Chicago Cubs, celebrated winning that elusive World Series championship.

And then it happened — they actually won it all. It happened at a time when I just happened to be living a lonely existence, but didn’t realize I was lonely. It happened at a time when I just happened to be battling depression without really feeling depressed.

But because of these internal battles, I’d let myself forget what it meant to be a Cubs fan. I made it all about me. Poor, poor me. In fact, it had always been about sharing the ups and downs. It was about the unspoken bond one automatically has with a another when they are both wearing a Cubs hat in a strange city.

Shortly after leaving Todd’s home in Arizona, I found myself in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I was wearing my Cubs hat and taking pictures of the city. As I explored I came across a fella wearing a Cubs championship sweatshirt and matching championship hat. He was talking to a man wearing a Cleveland Indians hat. They were both clearly enjoying this interaction and were rehashing the series in detail. As they were talking, the guy in the Cubs regalia happened to look past the guy he was talking to, and my own Cubs hat caught his eye. He didn’t break his conversation with the Indians fan, but he gave me a subtle nod and shot me a wink.  

Just a few days ago I was laying sleeplessly in bed, as usual, when that memory hit me like a slap in the face. I didn’t recognize it when it happened, but that nod and that wink finally brought it all home for me. That interaction is the reason we love sports. That is why we’re all so loyal to our cities and our teams. It’s moments like the two-seconds in Santa Fe that we live and die for. Because in moments like these, in strange cities far from home, when we feel the most alone, in those moments when we feel the most lost and confused and scared, in moments like these, we can finally allow ourselves to become overwhelmed by that feeling of warmth that rushes through us like an embrace from our grandfather.

I had forgotten why I wanted what I wanted. It wasn’t just for me. It wasn’t just for my mother, or my father, or my sister, or my grandfather. It was for every player and every fan who’d always wanted what I’d wanted. But in the course of my own struggles and my own mental battles, I’d lost sight of that.

I’ll say it again. Watching the Cubs win the World Series was the only thing I’d ever wanted. But yet when it happened, I was totally unprepared for it.

But fuck you if you think I’d change a goddamn thing.

During the summer of 2001 I worked at Chicago’s Family Golf Center. Despite the lacking and uninspired name, the Family Golf Center was a priceless gem located in the heart of downtown Chicago. Situated snugly on a patch of acreage south of the Chicago River, north of the Blue Cross/Blue Shield Building, and right between Lake Shore Drive and Columbus Drive, the Golf Center was an oasis among the glass and steel monoliths of the Chicago skyline. It was essentially the backyard to the Aon Center, currently Chicago’s third tallest building. (One sunny Sunday morning a few of us watched mesmerized as a massive Heavy Lift Helicopter hoisted a giant new air conditioning unit from the flatbed of an 18-wheel semi parked on the southwest corner of the driving range straight up to the top of the 83-story tower. That was pretty cool to watch.)

The Family Golf Center was truly something special. It was home to a 9-hole par-3 course that was far from challenging, but nonetheless a thrill to play every time. Its signature 9th hole was beautiful, however, featuring a somewhat daunting island green. The driving range featured dual hitting lines directly across from one another. While spaced well over 300 yards apart, on windy days golfers were not permitted to swing their drivers as the stiff Chicago gusts that would tear between the buildings if coming from the west, or roar off of Lake Michigan when blowing from the east, would carry well struck drives majestically across the range, much like one of Ernie Banks’ 512 professional home runs. One of the most amazing things I’ve experienced as a golfer was to be able to stand on the east side of the range at night and hit golf balls directly toward the immaculately lit Chicago skyline. There is little in the world that can compare to swinging a 5-iron and striking a perfect, high-arcing shot as it soars into the glitter of the sparkling lights of the office buildings, hotels, and condos that decorate the night sky. Don’t even get me started on nights where Navy Pier fireworks lit the horizon over the lake, or that time of year of the Air and Water Show when the Blue Angels would roar between the downtown buildings, disappear so far over Lake Michigan that they must have crossed into Indiana, only to return moments later in perfect formation and disappear to the west of the City. And repeat.
It was one of the greatest jobs I had. Sadly, my time there only lasted a single summer, and the Golf Center closed in 2003 as the land was repurposed by developers who turned it into an urban suburbia of sorts.

Needless to say, I accrued many wonderful memories that stay with me from my several month tenure at the Center. However, there was also a significant not-so-wonderful memory, as the events of the morning of September 11 that year unfolded. After watching, stupefied, as the World Trade Center towers came tumbling down, I realized I still had to go to work. Almost in a daze, I found myself driving into a eerily abandoned downtown Chicago, as those who worked there scrambled to evacuate the city. I walked into the facility to find my colleagues glued, teary-eyed, to the giant screen television in the bar. None of them looked up when I walked in, and after taking care of a few essential responsibilities, I joined them. We did have a scant number of patrons come to hit balls from the range that afternoon, if only to escape the horror of what we were all subject to that morning. But I remember taking a moment to stand outside alone, staring up at the massive Aon Center. Built just a year before the Twin Towers in New York City, the Aon’s construction design was actually duplicated for the Towers. It was a humbling moment to be in the shadow of this skyscraper, unable to comprehend the unfathomable prospect of such a massive structure crashing to the ground. Like everyone else alive at the time, I’ll never forget that day.

I could probably write pages and pages about that summer at the golf course, but my most cherished memories of working at the Chicago Family Golf Center, are those that involve the presence of Ernie Banks, who would frequent the course.

Before I had the opportunity to meet Ernie, I’d heard of his regular visits from the others with whom I worked. One of our golf pros, Gil Davis, would speak of Ernie as though he were an old friend. I soon realized that he was. Ernie was everyone’s old friend, even if you had just met him for the first time.

On days when Ernie would show up, he would enter the Family Golf Center with a humble flourish. Naturally, everyone knew who he was. Patrons would stop whatever they were doing, their faces lighting up instantly. Whether one was a baseball fan or not, a Cub fan or a White Sox fan, everyone took immense delight in having the opportunity to be in such close proximity to a living legend — literally; in 2009 Ernie Banks was designated as a Library Of Congress Living Legend.

Usually, Ernie would stroll casually toward the Golf Center’s front desk, shaking hands with whomever presented one. He would trade some banter with the employees he knew, and go out of his way to get to know those he did not. His glimmering teeth shone as that seemingly permanent boyish grin seldom left his face. He wasn’t the skinny kid anymore who was the first National League player ever to win back-to-back Most Valuable Player awards in the 1958 and ’59 seasons. His ankles were still skinny, but his thighs and hips were widened with age and hip replacement surgeries. He walked, not with a limp, but the gait of a man who had given his all to the 19 years he spent playing professional baseball. His shoulders, while not withered, were far from the shoulders of the man who hit more than 40 home runs in five different seasons. But then you shake his hand. While the strength of his handshake was far from overpowering (perhaps an intentional gesture from a man who was aware of his own prowess with a baseball bat), his massive paw would engulf the average person’s own hand, rendering it nearly invisible. And if one were astute enough to notice his wrists, he or she would swear that those wrists hummed with the intrinsic mass that is energy at rest. It wasn’t difficult to see why this once impossibly slender figure was such a prolific power hitter.

After catching up with employees and customers around the front desk, Ernie would walk slowly through the Center’s restaurant/bar. This is where I first met him. While I was a low-level manager of the Golf Center, my bartending skills were the most valuable to the place during the lunch rush. Those individuals lucky enough to be in attendance when Ernie stopped in would say hello, invariably greeted with his trademark smile, and his standard line, “How ya doin’? How’s the wife?” It didn’t matter if he knew who you were, he always asked about the family. Whether he actually cared about you or not, he sure as hell made it seem like he cared deeply.

So when I finally met him for the first time, I found myself starstruck. I’d seen him many times from the various vantage points that was my seat on any given day at Wrigley Field, as he’d show up at the ballpark regularly, embracing his role as Cubs’ ambassador. He would mingle among the players, constantly waving at fans. But when I met him in person, and Gil introduced me to him, I couldn’t help but revel in his presence. This was Ernie Banks! This was Mr. Cub! This was the first ballot Hall of Famer that my grandfather would gush about with adolescent giddiness. I was shaking hands with Ernie Banks. And look at those wrists!

The content of our first conversation is largely lost thanks to an inability for me to even comprehend at the time that I was meeting this man. But I do remember that he immediately put me at ease asking me a couple questions about golf. I’m pretty sure he cracked a joke about Gil’s own golf game, implying that it needed work (which it seldom did, from my perspective, anyway). Then he ordered something to eat, and went outside where he and Gil sat at a table on the patio, enjoying one another’s company beneath the shade of an umbrella.

Ernie was a relative fixture at the Golf Center whenever he was in town. He was there often enough that he knew my name. Ernie Banks knew my name! My favorite visits were always when he’d arrive mid-afternoon during the week when the place was quiet, and the bar essentially empty. Our exchanges almost always went the same way.

ERNIE: Hiya, Mike! Good to see you. How’s your wife? How’s the kids?
ME: Hello, Mr. Banks! I still don’t have a wife. And still no kids.
ERNIE: Well why not, Mike? Don’t you like kids? Marriage is the greatest. It’s great to be in love with a wonderful woman.
ME: I know it, Ernie. I just haven’t met the right woman yet, I guess.
ERNIE: You will, Michael. You definitely will. What kinda woman you lookin’ for, anyway?
ME: Well, she better be a Cub fan.
ERNIE: (laughs) Well that’s the truth. You’re a good man, Mister Mike. I’ll keep my eye out for a woman for you. We gotta get you some kids.

More than a decade has passed since those interactions, and still I remain unmarried and childless. But virtually every time I saw him, Ernie asked, “How’s your wife?” I almost feel like I let Ernie down. Actually, one night that same summer I found myself at a tavern called Tai’s ‘Til 4. It was a Wrigleyville staple that remained open until 4:00 am, hence the name. On this particular night, former Cub relief pitcher and notorious night-life enthusiast Kyle Farnsworth was behind the bar, pouring shots for patrons. I worked my way up to the bar, and managed to get his attention for a moment. Needless to say, Farnsworth was more interested in interacting with the ladies than he was with me. But when I mentioned that I was an acquaintance of Ernie Banks he actually leaned closer to talk to me. I remember asking about Ernie’s presence in the Cubs’ clubhouse. “When Ernie comes into the clubhouse, does he ask you about your wife and kids?” Farnsworth’s face lit up with a smile as massive as his gigantic forearms, and he actually stood up tall, leaned back and laughed out loud. He acknowledged that, yes, in fact Ernie would ask him that every time. He would ask everyone that same question, or some close variation. With this sudden kinship formed, Farnsworth shook my hand and poured us both a shot of something-or-other. We toasted to Mr. Cub, shook hands again, and then Farnsworth returned the focus of his attention to the ladies.

My absolute favorite memory of Ernie Banks, however, came late one evening as the summer was quietly dwindling away, and when the driving range was quiet. It was probably around 7:30 pm on a night when the sun wouldn’t set for at least another hour. I had been out on a golf cart just checking on the grounds. Only a few golfers were out on the course, and a smattering of individuals peppered either side of the driving range. I completed some of my various duties and headed back toward the maintenance shed, parked the cart, and proceeded toward the bar. I walked up toward the patio to find Ernie and Gil seated at a table, side by side, facing the driving range. They were just talking casually when Ernie saw me approaching. “Mike,” he said. “How’s the wife?” But before I could reply he invited me to join them. “It’s a beautiful, beautiful night,” he said. “Sit down and relax. You work too hard.” So I sat down.

For the next 40 minutes or so I sat with Gil and Ernie Banks, just casually talking about nothing in particular, and everything in general. He asked Gil a few questions about how to adjust his golf swing. He asked me some general questions about my golf game. I told him that I didn’t generally score all that well, but I was surprisingly long off the tee. I want to say that he smiled and made a comment about skinny guys with power. Then he gave me a tip or two, as Gil sat quietly and smirked. Eventually the conversation turned to a new style of tee that Ernie had begun using. His golf bag was situated just beside him, so he reached into a pocket and pulled out a handful. They were made of some sort of synthetic material and were supposed to help one’s drive remain true. Gil looked at it and I think he sort of wrote it off as a gimmick. When asked by Ernie, Gil acknowledged that he had tried them and didn’t necessarily notice a difference. Ernie then asked me if I’d ever hit off one . I told him that I hadn’t, so he insisted I try it right then. He tossed me the tee, and pulled a club from his bag. I think it was a 4-iron. “Go on, Mister Mike. Hit some balls with this.” I stood and took the club from Ernie’s huge hand, I clumsily grabbed a handful of range balls that were in a small bucket near Ernie’s feet, and walked the 20 or so feet to the hitting line on the range.

As I palmed a beat up, red-striped driving range golf ball, I bent down to press the tee into the turf. I stood and wrapped my hands around Ernie’s club. It was then that I became truly aware of the fact that the same hands that had once hit five grand slams in a single season (a record that stood for 32 years until Don Mattingly hit six in 1987) were regularly wrapped around the grips on the golf club that I was now clutching. I actually paused, standing upright with the club head in the air, and gazed at my own hands, my right pinky finger locked beneath my left index finger, as I cradled the club. A smile crept across my face. Before lowering the club to hit from the tee, I glanced back at Gil and Ernie. They both sat with crooked grins on their faces, somehow aware of the moment I was experiencing. Gil’s smirk conveyed an almost big-brotherly appreciation for being privy to this moment. Ernie’s smile was almost bashful. Not embarrassed, but humble. He knew that this was sort of a big deal for me. In hindsight I almost feel sort of silly. I wasn’t holding the bat that Ernie used to hit his 500th homerun, but to the 27-year-old kid holding Ernie Banks’ golf club, it might as well been just that.

I quickly gathered myself and stepped up to hit some balls off of Ernie’s tee. I have no recollection of how well I struck those balls, or if that tee in anyway affected the quality of my shots. But I’ll never forget the smell of the grass, or the scent of the lavender bushes planted nearby, or the faint odor of the car exhaust that sometimes wafted from the traffic speeding along on LSD. When I then exhausted the handful of balls I’d initially grabbed, Ernie reached into the bucket and effortlessly tossed another ball toward me. I’d tee it up, hit it, and he’d toss another. In all he probably tossed 10 or 12 balls my way, each invariably coming to rest at almost precisely the same spot between my feet. Even at 70 years old, this guy was still an athlete.

I finally walked back to the table, returned the club to Ernie, and resumed my seat along side him and Gil. We talked some more about the tee. We talked some more about random other things, as well. Again, the topics escape me. Slowly the sun began to disappear further behind the mountainous buildings that stood behind us. Closing time for the Family Golf Center was approaching and duty called again. Gil also had some things to attend to, so the three of us stood, taking a moment to wrap up whatever it was we had been talking about, and Gil and I returned to work. Ernie left the Center shortly after that, making sure to find us in order say goodnight. We shook hands again, and he walked out into the warmth of the summer night.

I believe that to be the last time I ever saw Ernie Banks face to face. He often split time between Chicago and his California home, not to mention his other missions of baseball and human goodwill around the world. (This man actually once had an audience with the Pope. The freakin’ Pope!) As the summer turned to autumn, my short stint at the Family Golf Center came to an end, and with it so did my brief friendship with Ernie Banks. Sadly I also lost touch with Gil and the cast of characters I’d grown to enjoy so very much. Just another the many lost lifetimes I’ve experienced over the years.

Clearly, I’ll never forget those interactions with Ernie Banks. I’ll never forget how he made me feel like I was someone he wanted to spend time with. I’ll never forget the soft Texas drawl of his voice as he spoke. I’ll never forget the gentle feel of his hand as it engulfed mine every time we shook hands. I’ll never forget the patience he exhibited as he signed autographs or took pictures with fans. (I never did get a picture of myself with him. A regret I have to this day. But I think at the time I was so content just to be around him that I honestly never considered it. Camera phones wouldn’t really be the norm for another two years or so.) But mostly I’ll never forget the sincerity that Ernie exuded at all times. He was always happy. He was always positive. He was always happy to see you.

Ernie Banks coined the term “friendly confines” in reference to Wrigley Field, but really, anywhere that Ernie stood could be called as much, because I doubt there could ever be another person in this world who was friendlier.

Fare thee well, sweet Mr. Banks. If you find yourself playing two on the Field of Dreams, hit one into the corn for me.

John and my father worked together for decades, and for more than just a single company. It’s safe to say that watching the interaction between the two of them over the years has had a major influence on who I am today. Their combined sense of humor always made my younger self wish I was old enough to work with them. They always seemed to make work fun for themselves, and their employees. As fate would have it, I eventually did have this opportunity for a brief period shortly before graduating college. I worked as an intern at the financial magazine for which John was editor-in-chief. Meanwhile, my father was editor-in-chief of its sister publication, and worked out of the same offices. I don’t think I appreciated it at the time, but it was a pretty great period in my life. As a kid I would revel in watching my dad and John play on company softball teams together and have a blast at company picnics, and now here I was, playing right along side them.

With all of that said, I like to think that it’s not a coincidence that the main character of this book is named Michael. (You know, ’cause that’s my name.) But I’m not here to speculate. The story opens in the mid-1970’s when Michael is a relatively average 19-year-old college student. Like many college students regardless of the decade, Michael dabbled in marijuana. But unlike most of us, his experimentation experiences lead to him being arrested for assisting in the sale of the drug. Basically he unknowingly directed an undercover cop to the dorm room of a student who was selling.

Michael has a childhood friend who’s father happens to be a very important member of a Chicago mafia family. He’s powerful enough to have easily saw to it that Michael never see any time in jail. But Michael’s father is a proud man and refuses to let his son be associated with a known crime boss. Between this pride and the low-income situation Michael and his family find themselves, Michael ends up taking a deal that ultimately does send him to jail. Of course this, mixed with the violent events that Michael faces while locked up, proceed to alter the course of Michael’s life.

Eventually, we move forward in Michael’s timeline and meet him again as he works as a mild-mannered professional living in Chicago. Of course, his past catches up with him as a bizarre series of events unfold, introducing a mystery which falls into the lap of a Chicago police detective who, naturally, has his own demons. The solving of the mystery almost takes a back seat to the amazing character studies and relationship development between several of the characters within the story, not the least of which involves the detective.

Honestly, this book had the potential to become completely cliche. As I sit here describing it, I’m becoming even more aware of how easy it would have been to fall into that writer’s trap. Obviously, having been close with the author for more than three-and-a-half decades, I wanted this to be a masterpiece. But my fear was that it would be trite, trivial, and poorly executed. Of course, again from having known John for so long, I should have known better than to worry. John has always been a character in his own right, and it wouldn’t be in his nature to publish something less than masterful. Is this novel a masterpiece? I don’t know if I can say that, but it is literally one of the only books I’ve ever read that made me openly cry. There’s a very moving scene between Michael and the mafia boss that was so well crafted and so delicately written, that before I knew what was happening I had tears rolling down my cheeks. I’ve read a lot of great, moving books over the years. There was a time that I devoured books with such voracity I would plow through two or three of ’em a week. During that time, I was certainly moved to laughter, and to sadness, but I don’t recall ever having been moved to tears. Dialogues of a Crime moved me to tears.

It might have been a combination of the joy I felt as I became more and more engrossed in this work of art that my friend had created mixed with a little bit of it being emotionally the “right time, right place” for that particular scene to move me. But regardless, there’s something to be said for any writer and his ability to garner a physical response like that. It’s an impressive feat.

Best of all is that the story’s conclusion is immensely gratifying. It’s a strange combination of what you almost want/expect, mixed with a touch of “what the hell…?” But John creates the finale with such grace and finesse, it works perfectly. It’s a Hollywood ending with Chicago flavor. Part of what makes it work so well is the culmination of the character’s cultivation within their respective relationships. Given some of the unspeakable scenarios that occur (which I’ve intentionally left out of this review) the need for a sense of closure with each of the main players is a necessity. But more importantly, it’s almost as if it gives the reader a chance to sort of decompress with the characters themselves. If written any differently, I fear we’d all put the book down left with little more than a case of the Bends.

This is so much more than just a great story, or an enthralling mystery. It’s an investigation into the human psyche as much as it is a look into the penal system, or the world of organized crime. It almost takes reader involvement to a new level of interaction. As I read the book, I found times where I actually put it down in order to ponder philosophical questions which were raised by the story. Seriously, what more could a person want out of a book?

I actually don’t know if my friend John has any other manuscripts in the works, I hope he does. And frankly, knowing him, I’m certain he does. I know I’m eager to read what’s next. In the meantime, I’ll have to reread this one again.

Somewhere around 10-13 years ago, I was enjoying a night with friends at the Pour House in Chicago, one of my regular hangouts. We became good friends with Al, the owner, and often went to after-hours bars with him. He knew a lot of people. On this particular night we went to the Golden Dragon, a Chinese restaurant in Olde Town that was situated very near Zanie’s Comedy Club. We’d been there before and were always treated to incredible Far East delicacies, and great liquor. The owner of the Golden Dragon was a character in his own right. He was a smallish Asian man who clearly loved America. If memory serves, he wore a plaid cowboy shirt. Some would consider this the shirt of a Wicker Park hipster. And one might’ve considered him as such if he weren’t wearing it because he actually wanted to be a cowboy. Even better, however, was his belt buckle, which he loved to show off. It was a functioning single-shot pistol that snapped into place. I only have his word to go on that it was actually a working pistol, but according to Al, his word was good.

On this night as we walked into the restaurant, however, it was impossible to miss the enormous human frame that was John Pinette. I didn’t know his name at the time, but I absolutely recognized him immediately from the final Seinfeld episode. Plus, he happened to appear on the Tonight Show just days earlier. I never watched the Tonight Show, but I randomly caught his set the night he performed. He was hilarious. Most of his jokes revolved around his weight, but he did it with such ease that it almost seemed as though he was making fun of someone else. Someone not in the room. I became a fan instantly.

It was well after 2:00 am and the restaurant was closed and essentially empty. Other than the four people in our group, the only people in the place were Asian John Wayne, a couple cooks we couldn’t see, John Pinette and another individual with Pinette. The two sat across from one another at a long table. I vaguely remember Al later whispering to me that the other individual was the owner of Zanie’s. I can’t be sure, but after doing some research I believe that person might have been Rick Uchwat, the founder of the club. Uchwat is about as highly regarded as they come in the comedy world. This article shortly after his death three years ago illustrates as much. 

As our group, led by Al, walked into the restaurant. Asian John Wayne saw us and immediately smiled and raised his arms as he walked quickly over to embrace Al. Any pretense of his forced cowboy swagger was lost in his enthusiasm to greet his friend, and he pranced gracefully through the tables to lead us the rest of the way inside. John Wayne recognized me as well from a past visit, but at this point I had already recognized John Pinette and was distracted, somewhat rudely, from greeting John Wayne myself. I wasted little time, having had plenty to drink myself at this point, I quickly spoke up. I remember it distinctly, in fact. Al and John Wayne were still exchanging how-do-you-do’s, and we were only about halfway inside the place, but I stood directly to his left, about 10 feet away.

I looked over at him and said, “Sir, I saw you on the Tonight Show the other night and you made me laugh out loud. Thanks for that.”

He looked right up at me with a twinkle in his eye. He smiled wide, those pudgy cheeks straining to points on either side of his mouth, and he responded with a truly sincere, “Thank you. Thank you. That’s sweet of you say.”

And with that we were quickly invited to join him and Uchwat (assuming that’s who that actually was that night) at their table. I took a seat to the right of Uchwat. John Pinette was sitting across from both of us. He was truly larger than life. At this point I don’t remember exactly what my other friends were doing. But I believe Al and John Wayne were chatting at the bar. I definitely remember that one of my friends had too much to drink and stealthily slinked his way to a booth and closed his eyes. And I think our fourth sat across from me, to John’s left.

John Wayne would shout some orders to the kitchen in Mandarin or whatnot, and for the next hour or so we were treated to platter after platter of delicious Far Eastern delights. I don’t remember what we talked about, but we were there for what had to be the better part of three hours. Without warning there suddenly appeared several bottles of Jägermeister. We each essentially had our own bottle and were instructed to pour ourselves shots at will. We did. Then several already rolled joints made their way onto the table and we were instructed to light up a fresh one at any time. We did.

I sat across from John Pinette for as long as I could that night. I laughed and I laughed and I drank and I drank and I passed joints to him and laughed some more and I took joints he passed to me and laughed and drank some more. Naturally, the amount we imbibed that night prevents me from clearly remembering the intricacies of our conversation, but the details of what we spoke about aren’t important. What I took away from that night was the way he welcomed us to his table with zero hesitation. Almost as though he’d been waiting for us. He talked to us all night like we were old friends. He asked us questions about ourselves, he told us stories about filming the final Seinfeld episode. We told him stories about little league or some such trifle and asked him about life on the road. But we never stopped laughing. I don’t remember a single joke he said that night, but I remember laughing almost non-stop.

The set that he performed on The Tonight Show was my introduction to him as a stand-up, but of course I knew him from the final Seinfeld episode. Since that time I’ve heard quite a bit of his comedy. I recognize that I’m biased based on this experience, but I might argue that he is one of the funniest comics of this era. As I mentioned, much of his comedy revolved around his weight, which was very significant, and sadly undoubtedly contributed to his early demise, but there’s no questioning the level of talent this man possessed. Not to mention that he was an amazing singer. To put it crudely, he was simply funny as shit. But moreso, in my mind, he’ll always be the warm and inviting gentleman who seemed genuinely interested in talking to us as much as we were interested in talking to him.

I thank you, John Pinette, for making me laugh when you were on Seinfeld. I thank you, John Pinette, for making me laugh when you were on The Tonight Show. I thank you for making me laugh when your bits find their way onto the comedy station I sometimes listen to as I try and fall asleep at night. But I especially thank you, John Pinette, for making me laugh like an insane man that night when I was lucky enough to sit across the table from you. The world just got a little less funny with your passing.

I’ve just listened to it.

Over the years I’ve seen various news footage videos of trains crashing into cars or trucks that find themselves stranded on railroad tracks. I’ve seen movies in which out-of-control locomotives run rampant until achieving the requisite derailment and explosion, preferably through a series of pylons holding up the roof of a subway tunnel under construction. I’m also relatively certain that I’ve seen multiple films where a subway train crashes into a well-placed ramp and crashes through to street level, sending cars and pedestrians flying.

Today, however, I truly understand how one can achieve the feeling of helplessness that must come when in the path of a train wreck. Today I know that horror — it is the type of horror that is the prelude to a fitful and unpleasant night’s sleep.

This is all because I listened to Nick Swisher’s damn album. Thanks to Nick Swisher I may never sleep soundly again.

Imagine being at a karaoke bar and hearing a relatively good singer then thinking that it’d be a good idea to record that karaoke singer and release an album. That’s what you get with Swisher’s album “Believe.”. Except in order to actually justify selling it, they added a bunch of kids as backup singers and called it a children’s album.

It’s awful. Have I mentioned that yet? Simply awful.

Click here if you’d like to share the horror.

If you buy this for your kids, I’m pretty sure that it comes with a visit from Child Services.

Lead singer Ric Ocasek handles all the vocals on this seventh album by the band. Ocasek himself has been quoted as acknowledging that Orr would have done a better job on half of them. While this is likely true, the album is still really good. It’s classic Cars. Isn’t that what we want? Too often you hear bands from decades ago reunite in an attempt to re-invent themselves. Too often these bands simply sound old. Members of these bands have a misguided interpretation of where they fit in within the confines of pop culture. I’ve loved The Cars since seventh grade. I remember walking home from school in the warmth of spring listening to “Just What I Needed” on my cassette walkman. At the time I had a crush on April Velazquez. I still do, really. And Move Like This sort of reminds me that I do.

The individual gray hairs that are beginning to decorate my beard might remind me that I’m not 13 anymore, but this album is as effective as any Just For Men product when it comes to reclaiming some semblance of youth. While it appears that the band hasn’t released any of the album’s songs as a single, it occurs to me that if the MTV that we knew in the 80’s (where they actually played music videos) still existed today, it’s possible that one of several songs off of Move Like This would be featured in heavy rotation. The best thing about this album is that they sound like The Cars. Each song is simple, poppy, well-structured, and quirky, yet somewhat profound.

They’re demonstrating their relevance.

One could argue that a drawback to this album is that it doesn’t really show any major growth by The Cars as a band. It’s true that they may have gone back to the well for the soft, repetitive two-string chords and light, steady high-hat beats that remain their signature. But that’s the thing, they didn’t forget the formula, and it still works. Though it might’ve been nice to see some departure, I guess that’s what solo careers are for. However, perhaps it also represents why the extended hiatus was a positive thing. Twenty-four years worth of these albums may not have been the greatest legacy, but an album like this ain’t too bad. Despite the nearly quarter-century absence, it’s nice to know that they’ve found their way back to the record store shelves. We still have record stores, right?

Again, it’s worth noting the absence of Ben Orr. His vocals would have perfectly suited songs like the enchanting “Soon” or the eerily familiar-sounding “Sad Song” (which doesn’t actually sound sad at all). This album is vintage early Cars. Many will remember Orr’s vocals from 1978’s “Moving In Stereo” which was featured in the movie Fast Times At Ridgemont High. If I have to remind you, it’s played during the slow motion Phoebe Cates/bikini scene.

That’s pretty much all that’s missing from this album. They’re lacking the mysterious synthesizer and Orr’s voice that helped make the Cars sound like a more complete entity. On no song is this more evident than it is on “Take Another Look.” Ocasek does a decent job with the song, but the opening lines make it clear that Orr’s higher vocal range was invaluable to the band’s success over the years. This does not diminish the overall brilliance of the album, however. It’s as a close a return to what we love about the band as one could hope.

The question is: what prompted this sudden reunion of the band? Ocasek stated ages ago that the band would “never, ever” get back together. Could this be their way of reminding people of who they are? Perhaps it’s a knock at the door of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame? Whatever the motivation, fans should be thankful. It’s an enjoyable album, and while not necessarily one of the greatest of the year, it is worth a download. You can do so for free here: http://www1.rollingstone.com/hearitnow/player/cars.html

Actually, nevermind downloading this album, run out to your local Record Town or Musicland to pick up a cassette tape of your very own. Just don’t hurt yourself trying to open that ridiculous, plastic shoplifting-prevention packaging that audio tapes used to come in. You know what I’m talking about, thirty-five-and-over year olds.

The album is produced by British DJ-turned-producer Mark Ronson. Ronson, who won a Grammy in 2008 for producing an album with Amy Winehouse, was only six years old at the time Duran Duran released Rio.

The first notes of the album appear to be signature Ronson. Not entirely unlike his own song, “Bang Bang Bang” released last year on the album  Record Collection by Mark Ronson and the Business Intl., these harsh, synthesized sounds that open the title track “All You Need Is Now” greet the listener almost as an assault the ears. But the jagged sound of the opening quickly gives way to the always perfect vocals of Simon Le Bon. It doesn’t take long to recognize that this just might, in fact, be your father’s Duran Duran.

After 19 years, they seem to have rediscovered the qualities that made them one of the biggest bands of the 80’s. While it wouldn’t be unreasonable to say that the album oozes the New Wave pop sensibilities that were so vivid on songs like “Hungry Like the Wolf” and “The Reflex,” it probably is fair to say that it’d be corny to say that. But nonetheless, there it is.

Mark Ronson appears to be a bit retro as an artist in his own right. As a DJ, he gained notoriety not only for his talents at mixing, but also because of the vastness of the musical catalog from which he sampled. As such, many of the studio albums he’s released have distinct New Wave qualities to them. In an odd twist, he now finds himself in a position to put his own stamp on the new albums by some of those very artists that inspired him in the first place. While the individual members of Duran Duran, and Mark Ronson himself may literally be a generation apart, this pairing clearly demonstrates that music spans all generational gaps.

Unless you’re a fan of Taylor Swift. Not sure how to explain that. Sorry, future.

Pretty early on I was told that I should avoid playing songs later in the night that might attract the wrong “element.” I didn’t necessarily agree with this, but I don’t own the place, so I went along with it. It’s not like I’d have started playing hardcore rap all night every night, but it would’ve been nice to have the freedom to mix up the late-night playlist to include more R&B, club/dance, and some hip hop. But I was told what to avoid, so I did.

On one or two of those weekends where the owner was away, however, I might’ve pushed the envelope a bit. I’d put on Skee-Lo. Tone Loc. Candyman. Musto and Bones. These artists are more likely to attract drunken, white, 20-something douchebags than they are the “wrong element” that this owner seemed to fear. But on that first occasion when I worked up the courage to sneak a Tribe Called Quest song into the mix, you can imagine my surprise when the place wasn’t burned to the ground. I think I’d been conditioned to believe that if it was after midnight and I played “The Humpty Dance,”  a gangland massacre would’ve been the result.

So last night while DJing at this same Chicago bowling alley, I was berated by one of the owners for breaking this unwritten rule. I was told that I “still don’t get it.” I was told that there are undesirables in the place who the owner would like to see leave and the song I was playing was encouraging them to stay. The fact is that I can take criticism with the best of ’em. In fact, I often seek it out. It’s how we get better at stuff in life. However, I simply have no tolerance for being treated like an asshole. And while it may be difficult for many to believe, I AM actually an adult. If I got drunk and ran over your dog with my car, yell at me all you want. If I irresponsibly forgot to pick you up at the airport because I was playing video games, yell at me all you want. If I sold all of your heart medication for beer money and as a result you had a massive heart attack and died before being brought back to life only to die again, come back and haunt me and yell at me all you want. I deserve it. But when you yell at me for playing a song you don’t like, it’s a good bet I’ll let you know I don’t appreciate it.

Nonetheless, after the brief dressing down I received last night, I bit my tongue, loaded up a classic rock playlist into the computer, and walked over the bar in an effort to cool down. I was pissed, but I was gonna choose my battles. Walking away was my way of letting it go.

I sat at the bar next to a friend. I had a beer as the playlist  played and then fell into conversation. Not really thinking it was a big deal, I remained away from the front counter and the DJ computer for awhile. Apparently I stayed away too long. The owner came over and asked if there was a reason why I disappeared. I responded that I loaded up a long list of songs and came to sit down. I was then told, “You don’t work here any more.”

Fired. Fired for playing a song.

The song I played? “Wishing Well” by Terence Trent D’Arby.

As a rule, I find that I personally often feel sort of helpless. It’s a byproduct of succumbing to one’s own limitations. What I mean is that I recognize that I’m not a wealthy person at the moment, so when I really feel the itch to golf an amazing course somewhere, I feel helpless. I simply can’t make it happen. Perhaps that’s less a feeling of helplessness than it is of longing. But either way, it’s a feeling of not being able to do something I’d like to do based on materialistic desires.

But the thing is, if I can’t afford to go golfing, or if I can’t break family plans to go see an Elton John concert or something, at least I don’t feel like I’ve been punched in the gut. Right now that’s how I feel. I’m a bit overwhelmed by it all, in fact.

The question is clear though: why now? Why this disaster? I didn’t feel the need to drive to New Orleans and help when Katrina hit. I didn’t feel like loading up my car with supplies and heading to New York City after 9/11 occurred. Why this time?

My only guess can be that it goes back to the idea of dealing with one’s limitations. I’ve been living my life lately with a feeling of self-sympathy. I’m out of work and financial problems have forced me to live with my parents again. For months I think I’ve basically been feeling sorry for myself for letting my situation develop like this. I thought I’ve been feeling helpless.

But last night I watched a landscape literally being altered on live television. What kind of helplessness must a person feel when they’re trying to outrun a 25-foot wall of water?

So why do I feel such a stronger sense of desire to help relieve this disaster than I did in the past? It’s because I need to make up for the days I’ve spent sitting around feeling sorry for myself and feeling bad for my living situation and basically feeling like the world owes me better than I’m getting. Because no one owes me a damn thing.

The worst part of it is the simple fact that I know this feeling will pass. Of course, we’ll remember the big Japanese earthquake/tsunami of 2011, and we’ll all hope everyone is okay, sure. But speaking for myself, I know that eventually I’ll go back to feeling shitty about my life again and the world will continue to be self-absorbed — as it probably should be. And in a few months or years there’ll be another disaster and we’ll all do it all over again. Frankly, I won’t be surprised if I’m back to normal by nightfall. This is why I want to get on a plane right now and help. Commit while the feeling is strong.

But I won’t. I’ll make myself a sandwich and I’ll be pissed off that we’re out of pickles. I hate myself sometimes.

If you are able and willing to donate, this link will help you out.

If only I had a dollar for every hit.