Even the moon was caught wearing red Wednesday evening as the Boston Red Sox earned their first World Series victory since 1918.
October's total lunar eclipse, nicknamed the "Blood Moon" after its reddish hue, may account for the Sox's seemingly effortless 3-0 shutout of the St. Louis Cardinals. It may also account, in part, for the odd behavior of Brown's Red Sox fans throughout campus last night.
A jubilant crowd gathered outside Josiah's immediately after the Red Sox clinched the game by throwing out St. Louis' Edgar Renteria at first base. Less a riot than a celebration, the crowd marched up Thayer Street, linking arms and high-fiving car passengers through open windows. Horns blared. Students chanted. Cameras flashed. Helicopters circled overhead. Police officers looked on in amusement, sounding their sirens intermittently to keep the crowds from blocking traffic.
"Can I get a cigarette for the Red Sox?" one student prompted another as they watched the crowd pass.
The group of about 200 students continued on, crossing Pembroke Campus and then marching down Brown Street. At one point the "march" quickened into a light jog as an increasing number of students stampeded onto the Main Green, where they quickly formed a large circle, linking arms, bumping chests, singing Neil Diamond's "Sweet Caroline" and even lighting a small fire. Wary police officers watching the scene quickly stomped out the fire.
Hiro Tanaka '08 said that "what was momentous" about the Sox's victory was that their status had always been comparable to "an untied knot" - something was always left undone. Now that it's finally finished, Tanaka said, "It's the beginning of a beautiful new history."
He also commented that all Red Sox fans, whether they heard the victory on the radio or watched it on TV with a group of friends, felt a connection between the 1918 Red Sox team and every team the Red Sox had fielded since then. It was as if there was, Tanaka said, "some fiber that ran through them all."
James Tierney '06, Matthew Nicholson '07 and Michael Yamartima '06, all decked out in Red Sox jerseys, were preparing to leave for Boston to be a part of the celebration. "It's a lot of people acting pretty irresponsible," Tierney said.
Providence Police Officer Michael Harris said that he and his fellow officers certainly expected crowds at Brown, but their real concern was with campuses like the University of Rhode Island in Kingston, where they expected more excessive rioting.
If the underdog status of Boston's team has united America into a so-called "Red Sox Nation," many fans wonder what will now become of the team that couldn't.
"We won't rest on our laurels," said Jessica Kerry '08.
Keith Hankins '08 noted that the Red Sox don't expect victory - "They earn it," he said.
Many students also posited a link between the long-awaited Red Sox victory and the possibility of success for the Democrats in the presidential election. "Hopefully this is just a prelude to a Nov. 2 victory for Mr. Kerry," said Dave Bedar '05.
Massachusetts native and Herald staff writer Katie Larkin '08 echoed Bedar's comment, saying that the Sox and Democratic victories will "definitely go hand in hand."
Dan Leventhal '07 and Mark Tumiski '08 both noted that their grandfathers would have loved to witness a Sox victory at the World Series. "(My grandfather) always complained they didn't take the pitchers out soon enough," Levanthal remembered.
Linnea Sanderson '06, who watched the game with a friend at Tortilla Flats, a bar on Hope Street, commented that both she and her companion were shaking when the game ended. Sanderson's earliest childhood memory was during the 1986 baseball season when, during a broadcast of the Sox at the World Series, her uncle dropped her.
Sanderson noted that the quick victory this year for the Sox "almost made it seem too easy." And while the apparently effortless win was perhaps less suspenseful than expected, Sanderson added that the team is fun to watch. "The dynamic they have is fabulous," she said.
In the study of geology, Sanderson said, there is a phenomenon known as magnetic reversals, in which magnetic poles "almost switch directions." Tomorrow morning, Red Sox fans will wake up to a complete reversal of fortunes, Sanderson said.
And while the total lunar eclipse won't occur again until 2007, Red Sox fans everywhere can always look to next season.
