The Scrubs

I haven’t always been a Cubs fan. Growing up, I liked the St. Louis Cardinals. My mom, though, liked the Cubs, and once, when I was five or six years old, she told me I wouldn’t be able to live with her any longer if I continued cheering for Ozzie Smith’s team. Again, I was only five or so, and I truly believed I was going to get kicked out of the house, so I started wearing the Cubs T-shirts and hats she bought me. A few years later, though, I got wise to her scheme and realized my sweet old mom wasn’t going to kick me out of the house because I refused to sing the Jody Davis song along with her and Harry Caray.

So I spent most of the rest of my youth cheering for the Cardinals and calling the Cubs the Scrubs—I wasn’t one of those kids who filled notebooks with stories, but I did play around with words all the time, and when I was seven or so I thought the Cubs/Scrubs pun was about the funniest thing in the world.

It wasn’t until I was twenty-two and a wannabe writer working crappy jobs that I started cheering for the Cubs in earnest. You see, it wasn’t until I became an underdog in life that I started appreciating what it means to root for the Cubs.

Now, however, I’m a little past the underdog phase, and I want to see the suckers win, especially after the enormous letdown that was 2003.

And this year’s Cubs team, it’s a tough one to love. In fact, I have tickets for a night game next month, and I could not care less about going. Even the old Scrubs joke, I’m just not feeling it.