Oct. 31, 2004 - Red Sox Nation

The alarm went off at 4 a.m.; I was scurrying around to find my red turtle neck and my red hooded Sox sweatshirt, trying to feed the dog, and trying to wake up. It felt like Christmas morning except it was different. We were dressed and out the door by 4:30 am. This is NEVER heard of in our house, at least not by me or Morgan. We picked up Don and were on 95 and through Pawtucket by 5:00 a.m.

We went to Quincy Adams center to get the first T into the city, the train picked the four of us and the other 300 people up exactly at 6 and I was standing at our beloved Fenway Park at 6:25 am.

She was so pretty, all lit up and waiting for her glorious parade. All the duck boats were inside waiting for their shining moment. I had goose bumps all over my body. The atmosphere in the city was amazing. Over at Fenway it was quite and peaceful, the cops were being nice and greeting everyone with a �hello, good morning� we walked down to the corner of Van Ness where the players parking lot was and decided to set our location at Boylston and Jersey. We had front row. It was already 6:45 am. We kept chanting 3 more hours, 3 more hours.

Waiting was awesome. Three hours and counting�what the fuck do we do with our time? Nothing, sit and talk to the people around you, hear their stories and the reason that they are here. I met a girl from California, Indiana, Virginia and this whole family from New Jersey who never lived in Boston, but had been Sox fans their whole life; drove up all day on Friday and slept in the car and sat on the parade route at 3 a.m. We chanted different sayings at various hours; things like �keep the peace, keep the peace� as the cops drove by. As the sun started rising and the rain drops kept falling the energy grew. Again I can only tell you it was like nothing I had ever seen before in my life.

The streets were all blocked off, the only cars on Boylston were the buses shuffling the police from one end of town to the other, and various EMS vehicles, but then right in front of us was a green Land Rover and in the driver�s seat was none other than Tim Wakefield. It was so awesome, we started screaming and clapping and yelling �Thank You Red Sox, (clap, clap) Thank You� I was standing so close to the car that not only was I able to touch it, but I could see the smile/scared/excited look on his face and he waved and drove through the crowd. The next vehicle to drive in was Terry Francona in his Ford Explorer, the cheers got louder and the crowds took pictures, all this and it is only 7:30 a.m. Orlando Cabrera and Timlin walked through the crowd to get to the gates at Fenway. So cool. I do have pictures but they are not the best, it is hard to take pictures while jumping up and down and running.

The parade started I think at 10:30ish, definitely not on time and the rain had just let up. It was so worth the 4 am wake up and the wait. The best picture of the day was of my beloved #7 Trot Nixon. It was over in the blink of an eye. All that wait and excitement for 5 minutes. Luckily we were front row and actually saw what was happening. I can�t imagine what it was like further down the parade route where they were 20 rows deep.

The subway was so crowded, we waited for 20 minutes, and we were only 10 feet from the yellow line. Six trains came and went and we still didn�t move closer to the platform. Finally we got on the train and we were totally crammed in, but what a feeling to be on a train and back to the car by 12:45. It felt so good to see my car sitting in the front row at the train station, in and out and home by 2:00 p.m. just in time to take a nap and get ready for the Halloween party.

The best day ever.

Thank you Red Sox, thank you.