Well, we’re back in Toledo.
*sigh*

This was a good weekend. I needed this weekend. I slept yesterday morning until 11 a.m. Toledo time. On a bed that was as comfortable as puffy clouds.

It doesn’t matter that I forgot my camera and therefore couldn’t take any pictures of Wrigley Field. It only mattered that I was there. Yes, I cried a little. Not as much as I feared I would. The game itself was quite entertaining. The Pirates threatened in the first inning, getting a few base runners out there, but fortunately only scoring once. The Cubs responded emphatically in the bottom of the first, with a first pitch home run by leadoff man Alphonso Soriano. Oh yes. It was beautiful. Then Mark DeRosa was hit by a pitch and went to first. D-Lee came up with a base hit. Runners on first and second for Aramis Ramirez. Ohhhhh Aramis. A three-run homer that didn’t just leave the field. It left the park. I’m not sure, but it might have left Chicago entirely.

At the end of the first, it was Cubs 4, Pirates 1. Pittsburgh added another in the top of the second. The Cubs got it back in the bottom of the inning.

And then in the top of the third inning, all hell broke loose and suddenly the Pirates were ahead, 7-5. Amazingly, I wasn’t nervous. I knew that there was no way in hell the Cubs were losing. I’m not sure why I felt that way; after all they lost the game that JM saw. (However, JM left early and they WERE winning at the time.)

I wasn’t worried even though it was the Pirates and that the one game I distinctly recall watching with Mike was against the Pirates. That game, which admittedly wasn’t during a winning season, the Cubs got behind early and couldn’t get anything done. I remember that Mike and I were watching the game in a somewhat dejected silence. (It probably had something to do with the fact that a friend was a huge Pirates fan and we didn’t want to hear him gloating.) All of a sudden, things started happening. The bases were loaded. And someone - I can’t recall who but I’ll guess it was either Sandberg or Dawson - hit a grand slam. Mike and I jumped up from our seats, ran to each other and hugged! We were ecstatic! And then the Pirates answered back with their own grand slam the following inning.

That was the day when I learned the most important lesson there is to know about this game (and trust me - it came in handy with all the years of Little League I watched): In baseball, anything can happen.

But this time, even though it was the Pirates, I wasn’t worried. And I was right. The Cubs tied it back up in the bottom of the third and then things s-l-o-w-e-d down until the sixth. Nothing was going on. I almost got bored. Riiiight. Come on, I was at Wrigley Field! No way in HELL was I bored!

In the bottom of the 6th, my Cubbies opened fire on the Pirates, scoring another FIVE runs. And Aramis… ohhhhh Aramis… hit a second three-run long ball. Cubs 12, Pirates 7. The catcher, Geovany Soto, also hit a two-run shot. (There was a moment in the 8th when we all thought Aramis Ramirez might have hit a THIRD home run. But it was caught on the warning track.)

What took place in the 7th inning stretch might have been the coolest thing about being there on that particular day. Friday marked 10 years since Harry Caray’s last game leading the crowd in “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” In honor of that, his widow, Dutchie Caray, threw out the first pitch AND led the crowd. But starting things off was a tape of Harry during that last game. Way cool.

Final score: Cubs 13, Pirates 8. They won on Saturday, too. Today is their final home game. I just noticed that postseason tickets go on sale today, supposedly about 90 minutes ago, but I don’t even see a link. Sold out already? Not that I could go. But I’d be willing to try….

GO CUBS GO!

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