My dad handed me two CTA tokens and a sawbuck on a Sunday night before bedtime. He told me that I could jump on the Lake Street elevated train and ride into the city Monday morning.
He suggested maybe spending some of the money to buy a book at Kroch's and Brentano's.
My dad forgot to turn the kitchen radio off Monday Morning. When I woke up, they were talking about the Cub’s game on WGN. My dad also forgot or purposely left his Sun Times on the family room coffee table. The Oldman read the Sun Times on the L in the morning because it folded like a book, which made it easier on the crowded morning commute.
One of the men on the radio mentioned how he loved buying a ticket for the bleachers for $1.50. Tickets went on sale the morning of the game. So, it was first come, first serve. Once you bought that ticket you can run up the ramps and find any seat you wanted. The ticket lines formed an hour or so before game time and I had to hurry and get dressed. I wasn’t going to the bookstore; I was going to the ballpark.
I took the Lake Street from Oak Park into the Loop a bunch of times, but I never transferred to the northbound Howard by myself.
It was Monday, June 25th, 1979. One week before my thirteenth birthday. I wore jeans that my mom cut into shorts and a light green golf shirt with a blue collar. My dad had a rule to look nice when you went downtown, so I put on a collared shirt rather than a t-shirt.
I walked over to the Ridgeland stop and waited for the next train. I had the newspaper tucked under my shoulder, fourteen bucks in my wallet, two tokens in that little pocket in my Levi’s and an Indianapolis Indians baseball cap on my head.
An old black gentleman got on the train at Cicero and sat in the seat perpendicular to mine. He asked me if I was going up to the game and who the starter was that afternoon. I opened my Sun Times and told him Lynn McGlothen and he shook his head with approval.
I got off the train in the Loop and nervously found the transfer that I needed to get up to Addison and Cubs Park. The northbound train was much more colorful than my first inbound train. It smelled like cigarettes and piss.
The train arrived and the ballpark looked gorgeous from the L platform. The flags were blowing on the centerfield scoreboard and faces were drawn with smiles all around.
I got in the line behind the bleachers and was about twelve spots from the front. I bought my ticket and ran up the ramps with everyone else. I was out of breath when I came to the entrance overlooking the field. The seats were still empty and I ran down to the first row on the right field side. Most people were heading to the left field side because that was where Dave Kingman played that year. 1979 was the year of Dave Kingman and I always daydreamed how awesome it would have been if he played on my Southside Hitmen two summers before.
Before I knew it, I was taking off my hat for the National Anthem. Led by Ivan DeJesus and Billy Buckner, the Cubs rocked Steve Carlton. Carlton left the game in the second and by the third inning the Cubs led 8-0.
I was getting hot and needed to take a leak and get a hot dog. When I got back to the bleachers I decided to head up and sit under the centerfield scoreboard. It was less crowded up there and I could spread out and drink my pop and eat my hotdog. Second bite and mustard slapped down onto the front of my green collared shirt.
I didn’t care, I was in kid heaven. As the game neared the fifth inning I started to think about my dad. He’s probably going to shit when he finds out about my impromptu trip to the ballpark. He gave me ten bucks to buy a book to read that summer and I spent it haphazardly at a Cubs game.
I left the game with my ticket stub and a mustard spot on my shirt. I tracked back home without any problems. Only the fear of the price I was going to pay when I got home without a book.
I could say I left it on the train. I’d get in trouble for being a dumbass and that wasn’t as bad as going all the way up to Wrigley Field by myself.
I got home and my dad was already sitting in his chair in the family room. Right away he asked about the book and the mustard on my shirt.
“Dad, I took that sawbuck and those two CTA tokens and went to the Cubs game.”
He looked at me silently for an eternity. Closed his eyes and took a deep breath,
“You’ve got to be shitting me Moose?!?! You went to Wrigley Field by yourself?”
Then he asked me where his Sun Times was and I told him I left it on the train.
I got another… “You got to be shitting me” and the old “I don’t want to see you for the rest of the night.”
I went up to my room and read the program that someone left near my second seat in centerfield. I kept that scorecard for years.
Spontaneity…. The memory of going to a Cubs game alone outlasted the anger the Oldman had for me that week.
That next Saturday my dad took me to the bookstore in Oak Park and he bought me a copy of “To Kill a Mockingbird.” It took me into August to finish the book and that is a story for another time. A ballgame and a book that changed everything the summer that I became a teenager.
Go out and enjoy the warmth that Tuesday brings. Wednesday brings back winter.
Do something crazy today.
