How did I come to be a Red Sox fan?

I don't live in Boston, or even in New England, yet I follow the Boston Red Sox year-round, from the first day of spring training to the "hot stove" season, when the ballpark is empty, but the rumors of trades, free agent signings, and expectations for the new season keep the flames of Sox fandom going. My dad was born in Taunton, MA and grew up as a Red Sox fan, going to games at The Fens with his grandfather, also a fan. It took a long time, but he passed his love of the Boston nine to his firstborn daughter (me!). I was not a sports fan growing up in Northern Virginia and before satellite TV and the existence of the MLB Extra Innings package, following the Red Sox meant looking at the box scores in the paper. When we did get DirecTV and soon after, the MLB package, I would walk in the room and find my dad watching a Sox game and would watch for an inning or so. I thought that three hours was a long time to sit and watch a game I knew very little about.

My baseball interest kind of came and went for several years until last year, when I was having some medical issues and needed something to take my mind off my worries. I started watching the Red Sox games more regularly and it was then that I started to pay closer attention to what was happening on the field. I started to appreciate the complexity of the game and the strategies behind pitching, hitting, and running the bases. The characters that made up the team intrigued me as well, from the feel-good energy of Big Papi to the plucky determination of Dustin Pedroia, to the quirkiness of "Manny Being Manny" to the quiet leadership of guys like Jason Varitek and Mike Lowell. I fell in love with the Red Sox and, yes, they happened to be doing ridiculously awesome at the time with a huge lead in the A.L. East, but before anyone calls me a bandwagon fan, I have never rooted for another team other than the Red Sox and don't see myself ever doing so in the future.

I watched the Sox win the World Series in 2004, but I felt that that victory, as epic as it was, was for my dad and all the other long-suffering Red Sox fans who waited decades to see the team win it all. I didn't have a true appreciation of the heartbreak of all the "almosts" in their 86-year World Championship drought. Some might say that that doesn't make me a "true" Red Sox fan or whatever. But, think about it, if that's the case, then no one who has become a Red Sox fan from 2004 on into the future (not to mention kids today who were born after 2004) is a "true" fan. Better new Red Sox fans than new Yankee fans, right? ;-)

That's enough rambling for now. LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!