CUBS OR SOX- CHICAGO'S CIVIL WARS

April 6th, Chicago hospital, 12:45 pm the maternity ward waiting room is packed with family members as the first male child is being born.

"Nurse, let's get a move on here, we don't have much time." says the head surgeon in the delivery room. "But doctor, we don't have another delivery planned today, what's the hurry? Is there a problem with the mother?" "Yes there's a problem with the mother, she's not pushing hard enough and I have to be out of here in fifteen minutes, it's already a quarter to one and I got box seats." "What box seats doctor? What can be so important to hurry the birth?" says the head nurse grabbing for the baby's crowning head.

"The goddamn pre-game show is already on, I'm missing Sammy's batting practice, and the game starts at 1:15," shouts back the doctor. "The game? What game? I don't understand." "Jesus Christ nurse, were you born in a cave? Never mind, you musta been born in Kenosha, IT'S THE GODDAMN CUBS GAME!!"

"What game?" he mutters to himself "What a numbskull, the whole family's probably White Sox fans too." As the baby's full head appears the father and grandparents gather near the door to hear the babies first gasps of air... grandmothers hold onto grandfathers, the father clutches his blue Cubs cap, the doctor slaps the baby on the ass and the kid coughs to clear his airway, then out of his new born perfect, little pink lungs, before the scream, before any crying, as if to establish his place in the family, the child coughs out in small, almost unintelligible mutters, "k , k , ku , ku , kub , kubz."

Just then the babies father and his father and mother scream in joy, they're openly weeping for joy as the other grandfather faints dead on the floor as his wife tries to revive him and help him to his feet with tears in her eyes. "Honey, he didn't say Cubs, he couldn't have said Cubs" and she openly weeps and bends on the floor next to her husband, crossing herself and her husband crying "MOTHER OF MERCY!!"

"Honey, let us pray he didn't say Cubs, he must have said Sox." The grandfather comes to his feet and screams at the doctor.

"PUT IT BACK! PUT THAT HORRIBLE THING BACK! THAT AIN'T MY GRANDCHILD, THAT'S SOME ALIEN BABY, SOMETHING FROM THE EXORCIST OR SOMETHING, LOOK, HIS HEAD'S TWISTING AROUND, WE'LL NAME HIM DAMIEN, HE CAN SLEEP IN THE CELLAR AND EAT DOGFOOD ALL SUMMER IF HE WANTS TO BE A CUBS FAN!!"

And so begins the long line in the Civil wars of Chicago. Family vs. family, brother against brother, father against son, north side against south side. In every city in America life in spring time is a time of rejoicing, of greeting the coming warmth and cracking out the coolers and spending the day at the ballpark with family and friends rooting on the ONLY home team.

But in Chicago we're divided at the very core of the family come spring training, and come opening day, you'd better lock up the ammunition and hide the children, baseball season has arrived in the city and it's not just a simple home team rivalry with another city, it's the same damn city, and getting to an annual outing at the "friendly confines"… well… Russians have an easier time getting toilet paper in Moscow in winter than Chicagoans have at getting tickets to the Cubs/ White Sox series in Wrigley Field. In a city of well over 7 million, every stinkin' one of them a baseball fan, and every stinkin' one of them with an opinion (you will NEVER meet a Chicagoan without an opinion!) And the ivory and brick confines of Wrigley Field swelling to capacity when it nears 38,000 fans, that means that 6,962,000 people are gonna stand outside the park begging for seats to either declare their love for the Cubs, or tell the 19,000 "OTHER" fans "YOU SUCK".

Thus the big money maker outside the park is a t-shirt that on the front says "CUBS SUCK" and on the back says "SOX SUCK" The people who purchase these t-shirts are the ones that still have to go home at night and sleep without fear of being beaten to death by a family member or neighbor for showing the wrong side of the shirt. But the real fans just wear their red, white and blue "C" hat (anyone that has the nerve to wear the floppy hat has to be shot or castrated) or the black and white "SOX" cap. The Sox's are a little too cool to try to pawn floppy hats off on their fans, they don't even sell them at Comiskey Park.

The Sox fans are much cooler and yes their IQ's are just a little bit higher since they've only sat around for 43 years for a world series rather than the slightly dumber Cubs fans that have been willing to wait only 82 years for a playoff. (There are cities in Greece younger than the Cubs last World Series hats. When they find Atlantis, there will be white banners on the Grecian columns buried underwater with a big "CUBS WIN" on the front and Ernie Banks number on the back). And for the Cubs fans who have asked the question "If you weren't gonna go for a pennant why didn't you at least try to coax Michael Jordan and Mike Ditka out of retirement to play the outfield and Ditka as catcher, at least they're famous Chicagoans and well liked by everyone in the city, and besides, anyone trying to score on Ditka at the plate, well..can you imagine the PAIN?"

And yet, I did the impossible, or I should say my friend Julie Silverman in Chicago did the impossible; she secured four tickets to the opening volley between the Cubs and White Sox. Do I really have to say "white" before Sox?" Maybe in the slums of Boston where the Red Sox fans hide.

Easily $50 seats from the scalpers, maybe if you got there 2 days before game time, but come game time, mother's wouldn't even give their son's their beloved Cubs/Sox tickets unless it's in their wills after they're dead the tickets are so valued.

And so began my annual trek to Wrigley Field July 12th. My first thought was to buy a souvenir, a baseball that I could take back to Las Vegas with me and lie to my friends about the one-handed catch of that Sosa foul ball in the 4th. "Well we have signed balls, unsigned balls, we even have glow-in-the-dark balls in case the Cubs are playing in the World Series and the lights go out in Wrigleyville." THE GAME GOES ON! I grabbed a signed ball for $11, but for some reason it seams everyone on the team signed with the same pen because all the signatures look the same with the same ink.

Hmmm…anyone want to buy an official Cubs baseball for a hundred bucks? Signed by the team...in person.... really.

We walked into the park and walking up the stairs from under the seats, the first time you see Wrigley Field you'll know you're there. Like an emerald glowing in the dark, the dark underground under the seats gloriously opens to the green of the field against the ivy covered outfield wall, the old scoreboard from the 30's still looking the same as the day they built it. It's the only ballpark in the world that still uses a guy to climb through the scoreboard changing the old steel number signs from behind the scoreboard like you'd see in the old baseball movies from the 40's. The white foul lines running out from home plate just in front of the red-brick wall housing the box seats, out to the brownstone apartment buildings across Waveland and Addison streets just beyond the outfield bleachers where for a hundred bucks you can watch the game from the rooftop across the street, hamburgers and beers included.

The four of us (no way her sister Susie and boyfriend in tow, is gonna let us get away to a Cubs game without her) working our way to the upper deck, which at Wrigley Field is like watching a game from your second floor window to the street below, you can still see the face on the batters and watch the dust fly at the plate from anywhere in the park. Past the hot dog and beer vendors, peanuts, crackerjack and cotton candy everywhere. THIS IS CHICAGO BASEBALL BABY!!

Where we sat was the middle of enemy territory as we were almost surrounded by Sox fans. And every time the Sox got a hit the Sox fans stood up, pointed at the Cubs fans and screamed "CUBS SUCK!!" and every time the Cubs got a hit , the Cubs fans stood and pointed at the Sox fans and screamed "SOX SUCK!!"

That is until Ricky Guttierez hit a grand slam home run for the Cubs to seal the fate of the White Sox fans in the bottom of the 8th and sent them scurrying to the exits and onto the south-side trains waiting for them at the Addison St. L stop and leaving us 20,000 or so Cubs fans the last of the hot-dogs and beer as Cubs fans don't quit until the bottom of the 9th, or until the beer supply is cut off after they sing "Take Me Out To The Ballgame" in the bottom of the 7th, whichever comes first and with a guest singer every game, I'm just waiting until they get around to me, somewhere in the next century .....I'm waiting guys. You had the balls to put Barney the freakin' purple dinosaur on; you sure as hell can stand me for one day.

But alas, here comes August. For some it's boating on the lake and roasting marshmallows over the campfire, but on Chicago's north side, it's folding time at the circus, it's time to tape re-runs of I Love Lucy so you can watch them instead of enduring the imminent demise of the Cubs shot at a pennant come September. September in Chicago is just another way of saying "let's check the septic tank and patch up the roof before winter." While in other normal cities like New York or Atlanta they get to plan for the opening of post-season play, the pennant races are just heating up and kids are saving their school sick days to stay home for the home team's opening World Series day games in October.

And yet the poor school children in Chicago once again will have to wait for December and January for "snow days" to spend a leisurely day at home watching the snow fly rather than a Kerry Wood fast ball. Don't fret Chicago, after all, that child just born in the hospital will have to endure this for the next 70 years or so of waiting for the Cubbies to win a World Series, fortunately by then, I'LL BE DEAD, AND THEY STILL WON'T WIN A GODDAMN WORLD SERIES ..............................GO CUBS!!!!

Ken Pearlman
Las Vegas , Nevada ...via Chicago Illinois.