The Joy of Sox Movie

My latest tactic - “not trying” - really seems to be working. When I began, over the last few months, to feel a little burned out spinning my wheels to make movie things happen, I decided to see whether this movie was in fact meant to be. And, as described in my last post, things continued to fall into place, even when I backed off. Today, I’m reporting on the next big piece to so fall. And for those loyal readers who have been waiting with baited breath – yes, my kidney stone passed uneventfully a few weeks ago.

I’d been troubled by the lack of a truly accurate RNG recording of a live game – that’s the Random Number Generator computer program to measure crowd coherence. The results from my opportunities at Fenway were promising, but were distorted by bugs in the recording system. By the time I’d figured out how to synchronize clocks and maximize the computer program’s output, I’d used up my two official game invitations. As the Sox regular season wore down to it’s Oct. 1 end, I realized I had a fairly short list of influential people to call if I wanted to wangle a last-minute invite. I also realized that I didn’t have the energy or stomach to plead with a series of people I didn’t really know that well (Sox front office and NESN types), on the off chance that someone would feel sorry for me and get me a press pass.

So as I wistfully looked at the final two weeks’ schedule, I remembered thinking that the Friday Sept 28 game would be the ideal one to go to – still meaningful because the pennant had not yet been clinched and playoff home field advantage was still on the line, yet on a day that wouldn’t disrupt my work schedule. I consciously told myself that if it was meant to be, and if the forces of intentionality and manifestation were in full alignment, it would happen without any extra machinations on my part. What it really came down to was that my body and mind were too pooped to push any harder, and so I had surrendered to the flow, whether I wanted to or not.

So I was more than a little surprised to get home from work late two days later to see a message on our microwave bulletin board to call my friend Dave about the Sox game on Friday. Sure enough, through a weird series of coincidences (Dave’s son’s roommate’s parents couldn’t make their planned trip to Boston, so who would be able to use their primo box seat tickets in their absence?), a front row seat to history simply materialized. And since they were great seats - $100 5th row field boxes - that would be safe from the random beer spills of bleacher bums, I decided it would be safe to bring my laptop and RNG device to make one last set of readings.

As I write this post, the data is still being analyzed by my statistical guru in Colorado, but suffice it to say that Fate pulled a doozie in setting me up for this game. Not only was it a well-played game with some powerful emotional moments leading to a Sox victory (for me, the Ortiz HR topped the charts), but it was followed by a very unusual post-game post-script. The game ended with a 5-2 victory over the Twins, leaving the Sox one Yankee defeat away from securing the homefield advantage for the next two rounds of the playoffs. Problem was, the Yankees were ahead 9-6 in the 8th inning of their game, according to the Fenway scoreboard. So along with 15,000 or so colleagues, Dave and I stuck around to watch the scoreboard’s updates, to see if tonight was going to be the night.

The Sox management quickly got into the spirit of the evening by live broadcasting the ongoing Yankees-Orioles game on the center field Jumbotron screen. And so the dwindling crowd of fans got to watch a dramatic ninth inning Orioles’ rally against the Yankees’ invincible Mariano Rivera, to tie the game at 9-9 after 9. We also got to cheer for old friend Kevin Millar, now with the O’s and at bat with the bases loaded in the 10th. Those wild cheers were a poignant blend of grateful nostalgia for his ‘04 heroics and desparate hope for some ’07 magic, and though Kevin didn’t deliver, his teammate Melvin Mora did, bunting home the winning run in the bottom of the 10th. The remaining 5,000 or so fans went nuts, eespecially when the screen showed the Sox players celebrating in their clubhouse locker room just downstairs from us.

And then we loyalists were rewarded with an event that should send the RNG meter through the roof. The players came out onto the field and shared their champagne with us. They jumped onto the dugout roof, shook up the bottles and uncorked a spray of bubby that drenched us all, including quite a few underage patrons (it wasn’t a school night!). Unbridled happiness, high school-level goofiness and a blend of baptism, benediction and anointing all held sway as our prayers were answered. It was an emotional high point for thousands of us – I sure hope the RNG data will show the same.