Next up to bat: uh... nobody

Did I mention that we almost went to the World Series? I didn't? Oh.

Phil and I bought tickets in the mad dash to attend the first ever World Series for the Colorado Rockies. The underdogs. The low-paid, new guys. The team that would piss me off every season when I had a business studio near Coors Field, because Rockies fans would park near my studio, get drunk, and then pee all over the street where I could see them. I figured, if I had to watch two seasons worth of drunk pissing, didn't I deserve to at least attend the World Series?

Apparently not.

We had tickets to game 5, which would have happened Monday night. How did we get the tickets? Sheer luck, my brutha (or sista). Sheer luck. I tried to buy them on the computer upstairs, while Phil lurked in the basement, trigger-finger ready to pounce. Somehow his computer succeeded while mine was left in limbo, forever to circle around and around in a horrible countdown that would only start over and over. Oh, cruel Rockies. I shake my fists at you!

So, we thought that Phil had tickets to game 4. Oh, no. We ended up with game 5. The "maybe" game. The one that would happen if the ding dang Rockies would win just ONE game. ONE game, Rockies. That's all we asked. That is all that was required for my baby boy to attend what was most likely the only World Series to ever grace the Mile High City. Is that asking so much? Is it asking too much to use your superhuman mile high thin air power lungs and strength to beat Boston?

They said, "Mmmmm. Yup."

See, the thing is, I don't care about sports. Not a ding dang care in the world. I don't care about baseball. I don't think a thing of football. I scoff at basketball. I'll watch the occasional hockey situation, but I could do without it. I married a man who feels the same. We are not, in any certain terms, "sporty". I went to San Antonio Spurs games when we lived in San Antonio when we had free tickets, and what did I do? I brought gardening books with me to read. I did enjoy the mid-game dog show, however. Those dogs really knew how to jump. But I learned a heck of a lot about shrubs, I tells ya.

After watching the four games of the World Series, however, I started to feel the pitter patter in my heart, the flush of my cheeks, the curses bubbling up from my throat as Phil and I would twitch on the couch and groan at the players. I was, for a very brief week, a fan.

Phil was a little league feller as a child. He doesn't claim to be great at baseball, but he enjoyed it. I toy with the idea of having Amos play sports. I'll let him do it if he wants to, but we're not going to push him into it. There are other parents who feel a bit differently.

John Elway, the "star" of the Denver Bronchos, has traded in his new car dealin' days (yes, his name was on a bunch of car dealerships here, and our car, in fact, was bought from a John Elway Subaru dealership), to coach football at his son's high school (also one of the richest schools in the area, but that is neither here nor there). His son, as reported by our local news, has been chosen to play football for a college team.

Can you imagine the pressure this kid is under? Not only is he the son of the most worshipped man in Denver, famous for his football prowess, but he had to be COACHED by his father. And now, the pressure does not relent. He must continue this push to get out from under his father's shadow. His father's horse-headed shadow. Okay, maybe that's going too far, but Phil and I joke about John Elway and his gigantic teeth that are not unlike that of a horse. We may or may not also make annoying horse noises when referring to said fellow. I never said we were appropriate.

So, yeah. I raise my fists at the Rockies during the only time I really cared about a baseball game. Someday, I'll put Amos on my knee and tell him a tale of the time he almost went to the World Series, and how the Colorado Rockies let him down. How they let a small, innocent boy be disappointed that he couldn't shake a giant foam hand with one finger up or perhaps spin a towel in the air.

Phil is threatening to throw flaming poopy diapers at Coors Field, especially after finding out that refunds for the nonexistent game are sent four to six weeks after. I'm starting to understand the mind of the disgruntled sports fan.

Will the sun shine upon you again, Rockies?