mets or cards, it doesn't matter

We're going to the Series! News that made my shift ever so much better. One of the other bartenders found out for me, holding his phone below the level of the bar to check the score.

Part of this is that my dad got to see the game when the Tigers won their last Series, twenty-two years ago. He walked home from Tiger Stadium to 8120 Jefferson, a mile from the UAW headquarters--no small feat--in a delirium as people ripped out the stadium's seats and set cars on fire around him. That night he was so happy. My dad who played softball with a team from work, who taught me how to pitch and catch and hit.

But part of it is this completely atavistic thing, a piece of my theory that we do still hold place-based tribal identities even as we deny it. And our sports teams are the obvious manifestation of our tribal roots, our paid warriors.

Also, Justin Verlander's kind of cute, for 6'5" and 200.