How can this be???? I've spent my entire life hating the Yankees and now I'm one of them!?!?! You see, I'm a life-long Mets fan, so its just natural for me to despise that other baseball team from New York. That being said, I was informed a few weeks ago that the name of my son's little league team was the Yankees. Suffice it to say, I was stunned by the news. (I know what you're thinking.....and I believe the word is...........let me see.......oh yeah....."immature"). I know, but I can't help it. Those who really know me wouldn't expect anything less.
Then I was asked to be a coach for the team. Yep....that's right....I'm a coach for the YANKEES!!!!!! So every Tuesday, Thursday and Friday for the next 2 months, I'll be wearing a Yankee shirt on a baseball field. We've played 4 games so far and I'm already breaking out in hives.

Right now, those of you who aren't big New York baseball fans, think I'm a crazy person. You just don't understand. I feel the need to explain. I became a Mets fan when I was 3 years old, just after they won the world series in 1969. My older brother was a Mets fan so I just followed in his footsteps. Then we recruited my little brother. By the mid-70's, we were all one big happy New York Mets family.
UNTIL......my older brother decided to stop liking the Mets and switch to the Yankees. I still haven't forgiven him for his lack of loyalty. Soon after, my little brother betrayed me as well. It made sense to them, the Yankees were on the rise and the Mets were going in the opposite direction.

I didn't understand their logic at all. I held firm and my love for the Mets grew even stronger. To this day, one of my proudest accomplishments is that I didn't give in to the peer pressure. Meantime, the Yankees won the world series in 1977 and 1978 and the Mets were horrible. I had to watch my brothers celebrate while my Mets lost over and over again. To make it even worse, because they outnumbered me, I had to watch the Met games on a black and white television in the basement while they watched the Yankee games on the color TV upstairs. When we moved from New York to Arizona in 1979, we all suffered because our beloved teams were across the country. I got the worst of it because the one major league game televised nationally each week was usually....you guessed it...a Yankee game.
Fast forward to 1986. The Yankees were horrible and.........MY METS WON THE WORLD SERIES!!!!!!!!! I was a junior in college and I cried like a baby. My loyalty paid off and my love for the Mets grew even stronger, in fact, I've been living off that high for 22 years now. Which brings me back to my original point.......I'm now a Yankee. My family certainly gets a kick out of seeing me with that shirt on.

But you know what?!?! I'm certain that I'll have the last laugh when the little league Yankees win the championship and then later in the year, the Mets once again win the world series. Funny thing is, I don't know which team I'll be more proud of.

Hey wait a minute.....I may be maturing after all.