By allowing ads to appear on this site, you support the local businesses who, in turn, support great journalism.
Hello Hillsboro: Cub fans loyalty must be genetic
Placeholder Image

Have you made a New Year’s Resolution yet? If not, you can save a lot of trouble by resolving to make a resolution next New Year’s day. That will give you a whole year to think about it, and wonder why you should even bother.

I read a survey over the weekend and it made me consider not even bothering this year.

According to this survey, only 8% of Americans are successful at keeping a New Year’s Resolution!

Even worse, an amazing 45% fail by the end of January!  That figure definitely falls into the “why bother?” category. But I can do better than that, if only because my continuing resolution never really takes effect until the opening of the Major League baseball season.

My late, loving Dad left me with plenty of useful and accurate lessons on life, but I have to admit he really stumbled on one of the big ones.....unending loyalty to one of my life’s major disappointments, the Chicago Cubs.

Oh, I know he meant well, and probably was just passing along something taught to him by his Dad. I’ve noticed actual Cub fans all seem to suffer from this same mental distortion, so it must develop through some kind of genetic connection.

You can’t imagine the continuing fear that overtakes people with this disorder, beginning some time in March, usually spreading to the Midwest from Arizona and Florida about the time when something called Spring Training begins.

My wife was spared from the fate, perhaps being fortunate enough to somehow retain a few White Sox genes in her Chicago childhood.

My three children were spared from the disorder, perhaps due to mentally shutting out the continuing ravings of a rabid, angry Cub fan living in their home every Summer. They finally ended the torment by ignoring baseball and saving their sports attention for football, even though it was for  “Da Bears” back then!

They woke up to that problem and gained much better knowledge of football when we moved to Hillsboro. That good fortune has also spread to my grandchildren, most of whom wear Packer gear all year.

We all have a standing agreement, that includes a ban on team comparison debates and a confession from yours truly that, with my track record, I’m the last one who should  influence anyone’s love of sports.

However, in the first hours of New Year’s Day, shortly after watching that silly, lighted ball being lowered to the cheers of more than a million drunken New Yorkers, I once again silently vowed to not read another word on line or watch another WGN telecast of those eternal losers who haven’t won a championship in over 100 years!

Let’s face it. My chances of actually keeping that resolution are even less then the 8%  reported in the survey.
In addition, my mind can already detect the eternal optimism of my Dad and countless other fans from the great Wrigley Field bleachers in the sky. Try as I might, I just can’t ignore them.

Go Cubs in 2014!

By the way! Our family’s top loyalty, regardless of the sport, has been the Tigers for the last 24 years and will continue for many more.

Professional, or otherwise, you can’t find athletes with more spirit, determination, and pride. On the only scoreboard that really counts, they are always winners!