A Great Boston Experience

Times have been tough, lately. Of course, they’ve been tough on everyone, but it’s been a rough couple of weeks for us. A big fight with my family over Maggie’s birthday; the loss of my role at the Boston Globe; an uncertain financial future; my going back to work for menial pay; bills piling up and little money to pay them. Before our tax return came in on Wednesday, I was near certain we weren’t going to make this month. On top of it all, Sarah, Maggie and I hadn’t been into the city since January when we dropped my cousin off at the bus station. A big reason we moved to New England was for the Boston experience, and we had only been once since early January. The one time we did go was two weeks ago when Sarah and I decided the stress of our situation was starting to be too much on our family, and we needed a day to just relax altogether. We took Maggie to the zoo and ate at Fire & Ice.

That trip to the zoo was a great experience in itself, but this past Thursday, we had the most amazing time in the city; one of the best since moving here. Sarah’s mom Debbie flew up from Florida a week ago Friday for her spring break to spend some time with us before Desmond is born. It has been great to have her around as well, as it gives Sarah someone different to talk to and interact with, and Debbie is fun to have around the house, especially to play with Maggie. On top of it all, Debbie seems to be a mission to buy out every grocery store in the area, stocking us up on food so we don’t have to worry about it after the baby is born.

Everything has been great with her here, but the kicker of the trip so far was that Debbie scored Red Sox tickets for the last game of their home opening series against Tampa Bay, in a repeat of last year’s American League Championship Series. She and Sarah’s grandmother run the press box for the Red Sox spring training and have all sorts of connections with the organization. So, this Thursday, not only did Debbie get us tickets for free, but we met up with her friend Dennis, who runs the luxury suites at Fenway. Apparently, one of the suites was not in use on Thursday, and he let us stay in there the entire game.

Picture this for my and Sarah’s first Fenway experience and Maggie’s first baseball experience. Great seats in the upper deck along the third base line. A luxury box with leather seats and  a flatscreen TV in case Maggie needed to get away from all the crowd noise. All the beer and soda we could drink. Free Fenway Franks. Free pizza. Free pretzels and popcorn. Free access to the dessert cart that most luxury box folks must pay top dollar for. To top it off, the Red Sox even had a ninth inning rally after they played sluggishly all game. They ended up losing by one run, but we couldn’t have asked for a better baseball experience.