Reunion of Complete Strangers

During the playoffs last year, I was watching one of the games surrounded by a sea of hostile Yankee fans. (This is at a bar in Hoboken, I love going there to watch games and such because of the sizes of the TVs and it’s a bit off the beaten track). However, it is most definitely Yankee territory.

Here is my comment from last year on the pros and cons of this venue.

One night last year I saw 5 lonely men wearing Red Sox caps, surrounded by what seemed like 4,897 Yankee fans. I walked over, we struck up a conversation, we watched the game together, we became life-long friends. (For the evening, anyway. I promptly forgot about all of them the second I left.)

It was just one of those things. They welcomed me into their group. And we won that night, as I recall. Which was hilarious. My cell phone ringing off the hook, their cell phones were ringing off the hook – it was great fun.

Anyway – last night, I stopped by to this same venue after work to catch some of the game. (I don’t have TV at my house. I’m a loser.) It’s too early in the season for the bar to be crowded. Half the people in the joint were actually there for the hockey game on 3 of the TVs.

But anyway. I sat at the bar, facing a massive television – and within ten minutes, 5 guys came in and crowded into 5 stools next to me. They were rowdy, obviously good friends, smoking, drinking, talking on their cell phones, discussing the game. Within 1.3 seconds, I could tell that they were Red Sox fans.

I glanced over, one of them glanced at me – and instantly – we all recognized one another. It was as though we were long-lost friends. And there we all were, meeting up randomly in the very spot where we had originally met and become life-long friends. We were complete strangers, having a rapturous reunion.

“HEY!”

“You’re that girl from last year!”

“We remember you!” (I loved that. The collective “we”.)

“I was the guy who got in the fight – member me?” I did remember. Some Yankee fan had punched him in the face because of his Red Sox cap. Or maybe because of something else, maybe Red Sox fan stepped on Yankee fan’s foot, but the Red Sox cap had begun the scuffle.

I said, “Oh yeah! I remember the guy punching you in the face!” I said this enthusiastically, and happily, as though I were saying, “I remember that you opened the door for me.”

There was a brief pause.

He said, “Yeah, but you should have seen the other guy.”

Which was rather amusing, because I had seen the other guy – who had basically knocked Red Sox fan onto the ground, and walked away unscathed.

Funny. A little face-saving moment on his part.

Oh, forgot to mention this: I asked one of them, “So are you from Boston?”

He said, “No. Southern California.”

I said, “Then why on earth…”

He said, “Because I enjoy the torture, I enjoy being dejected, and I enjoy the brief moments of happiness.”

That is word for word what he said.