One Night 30 Years Ago

My experiences in school growing up varied so widely that, even decades later, so many of those times feel massively disjointed. I actually really loved school up through third grade, as I was fortunate to have many great teachers and classmates - this despite moving back and forth between Connecticut and Portugal. Fourth grade was the first time in which the learning environment and support structures felt as though they faltered, which coincided with some major upheaval in our housing situation and a forced move caused by my father leaving. Fifth grade was a mixed bag at a new school, with some great teachers and new friends, as well as the first occasion in which it really felt like peers could be meanspirited. Then came middle school, which was an almost non-stop mess of confusion, anxiety, illness, hormones, and, when it came to teachers in particular, indifference.

Moving up to high school was another massive shock to the system, as literally everything from the students to the building to the expectations felt drastically outsized in comparison to what had come before it. There was a vibe that this was the 'big leagues' and students were expected to learn to swim, lest they sink. Particularly with my array of freshman year teachers (which included the bitter older brother of then-NY-governor George Pataki, a history teacher whose daughter told people after her mother's passing that she did indeed loathe most of her students, and a retiring English teacher who mailed in the final marking period so badly that administrators had to adjust all of the students' grades), it was a challenge to find anyone even willing to offer aid in keeping one's head above water. This applied to the social aspect of high school, too, as the amount of peer pressure to join clubs, play sports, and be involved in seemingly every bit of school life was exceptionally formidable.

While I announced sports contests and went to football games to sort of fulfill these pseudo obligations, the first time that the overwhelm of student life really hit was for Homecoming. To say that the entire school seemed to be consumed by this event would be an understatement, as it felt like the upperclassmen's big celebration and that hype trickled down to the youngest students. Given my social anxiety, I had avoided every school-sponsored social event throughout middle school and did not particularly have any zeal for attending Homecoming. However, the vibe that I got was that this was something that no one missed, so you had better be there. Thus began a surprisingly meaningful night, as it turns out.

Charlie Hayes redeem from Arya

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The Homecoming bonfire took place on a Friday night literally across the street from where I lived and was the first indication that the hype around this event was a touch overblown. I mean, there was a pretty sizable fire and the band was there, but it was mostly just a bunch of idle standing around while kids three or four years older than me had a good time. I actually walked home to get a basketball so that some friends could shoot around while waiting for their parents to eventually return, as staring at a fire and hearing about Homecoming election results got old very quickly. The Homecoming football game was similarly unmemorable, as our school's team was almost exclusively built around giving the ball over and over again to a bruising running back who had broad shoulders straight out of Batman: The Animated Series and sported a beard that made him look like he was 35 years old. I think that we lost, but contests that year truly all felt the same when the offense handed the ball off to the same player on around 90% of its snaps.

Finally, though, it was time for the big event - the Homecoming dance. As fate would have it, the dance was aligned for basically the same time as Game 6 of the 1996 World Series (10/26/96), which proved a dilemma. Particularly in our area of Connecticut, there was no shortage of anticipation given that the Yankees were stunningly just one win away from their first title since 1978 after following up lopsided losses in Games 1 and 2 at home by taking all three tilts in Atlanta in close fashion. While I really preferred to stay home and watch the game, the external pressure to "be social" came in from all corners (friends, peers, my mother) and was too much to weather. As such, I had to get dressed in an extremely ill-fitting suit and felt some of the most inexplicably strong discomfort of my life when a tie was added to the mix. I most certainly did not have a date, which was likely for the best, and shuffled my way to our neighbor's house to get a ride to the school. However, while our neighbor Jim was originally slated to drive both me and his sister Katie, he was a senior who had opted instead to go to dinner with his date and their friends (understandable!) beforehand, so Katie and I instead hopped into her mom's car to round out the "boy is this underwhelming" picture.

I am not sure what I was really expecting at the dance itself, but it still managed to feel uninspiring. There was the required breathalizer test that was only interesting due to actually seeing another student have a positive test and blame it on eating a bagel with poppy seeds, the excuse that had made its rounds as a surefire way to successfully get around a positive test [spoiler: it did not actually work as an excuse]. The dance itself was merely held in our rather rundown gymnasium, with large sheets of plastic placed over the hardwood floor and most of the girls being required to remove their shoes. That felt a bit weird and unfair. I was in full-on wallflower mode from the outset, not understanding the social nuances or having any real idea what to do as the majority of the other attendees seemed to be having a good time. Then came a minor godsend - the janitors had set up a television in the auxiliary gym and it was airing the World Series game. I was off like a flash.

Chipper Jones redeem from Ty

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Initially, there were not terribly many folks watching the game, which was fine by me. Less talking meant that it was easier to concentrate on the action and this was poised to be a fascinating contest. As noted previously, the defending champion Atlanta Braves had absolutely crushed the Yankees in the first two tilts in the Bronx by an aggregate score of 16-1. That included romping in the opener behind a gem from eventual NL Cy Young winner John Smoltz and two homers by teenager (and also future HOFer) Andruw Jones, as well as a 4-0 shutout in Game 2 with tonight's pitching matchup on display. While a still-prime-level Greg Maddux completely had completely dazzled for the Braves, veteran lefty Jimmy Key was really fortunate to have only permitted those four runs while taking the defeat for NYY. Despite Atlanta shockingly getting swept at home, having Maddux on the hill on this night still felt like the significant advantage belonged to the visitors and that an epic Game 7 duel between David Cone and Tom Glavine was on the horizon. However, Key was able to dance around the raindrops in the early frames to keep things scoreless through 2.5 innings, opening the door to for New York to finally get to Maddux for the first time in the series. Two batters after Paul O'Neill opened the bottom of the 3rd with a double, Joe Girardi delivered the game's most shocking blow by ripping a ball over the head of drawn-in center fielder Marquis Grissom for an RBI triple. Rookie Derek Jeter followed with an RBI knock and Bernie Williams continued his brilliant postseason with another run-scoring single to round out the three-run frame. The Yankees fans in the room began to spread the word amongst their peers, while those rooting against the Bombers seethed a bit.

In spite of this outburst, fortunes still felt wobbly for the home team, as Key's inability to miss bats resulted in Atlanta loading the bases with one out in the top of the 4th and rookie Jermaine Dye (who, like Jeter, would later become an all-star and a World Series MVP winner) drew a five-pitch walk to get the visitors on the board. Terry Pendleton had been reacquired by the Braves late in the season to provide a veteran bat in a fairly youthful lineup and sat poised to come through in an effort to finally be on the winning side in a Fall Classic, as the former NL MVP was 0-4 in World Series competition. However, while Key again fell behind a hitter 3-1, he found a way to induce Pendleton to hit into a 6-3 groundball double play to squash Atlanta's rally. Was this Yankees squad really a "team of destiny?" The energy level in the room was all over the place after the Pendleton rally-killer, as the drama of each half inning was palpable. Things suddenly got much more dramatic when someone pulled the fire alarm.

Bernie Williams redeem from Beer

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It was a bit of a mess to get several hundred students out the door, particularly given that most of the girls' shoes were in the auxiliary gym. That endeavor was eventually successful, though, and we found ourselves standing outside waiting for the fire department despite the news already making the rounds that one of the kids who had been denied entrance had triggered the alarm to get back at the administrators. While there was definitely a late October chill to the evening, it was really not that brutal of a wait - unless you were wearing a dress like half of the attendees, of course. I eventually found my way to some fellow freshmen, including my friend A and his date B, who was not having a great time with the temperature. I do not remember the specious reason while A was unwilling to lend his jacket to his shivering date, but it did not hit me terribly well and I was fine with helping out a classmate in need. While handing my jacket to B, a thought crossed my mind:

'I wish that I was wearing that dress rather than what I have on.'

Um, where did that come from?! My already existent anxiety spiked hard, as I felt even more confused than I already was in my normal waking state. To my knowledge, I had never had a formal thought about wanting to be a girl. In retrospect, I think that there were some occasions of dancing around the subject in my mind - nothing this overt and nothing this confounding, though. The rest of the outdoor wait is as much of a blur now as it likely was then. We hung out in the chilly air, the fire service eventually came to see that the alarm had been triggered erroneously, and we eventually filed back in. I received my jacket from a profusely grateful B and somehow managed to continue moving, all the while my head was swimming. There was really only one answer that I could think of for the moment - get back to the baseball.

John Smoltz redeem from Tank

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After so many major events in the early innings of the contest, the 3-1 score that we had left during the mandatory evacuation remained intact until the students returned inside for the resumption of Homecoming. Jimmy Key had apparently hung with Greg Maddux until giving way to midseason acquisitions David Weathers and Graeme Lloyd, each of whom recorded a critical out to stymie an Atlanta scoring chance in the 6th. The Yankees then handed the ball to Mariano Rivera, who capped his breakout sophomore season with two stellar innings of relief in what would prove to be his lone year as a setup man before embarking on a Hall of Fame career as a closer. For his part, Maddux had completely handled the New York lineup save for that one blip in the 3rd, with the future Hall of Famer almost going the distance to give the vistors a chance. While I am sure that I saw at least some of this action, what I remember about the end of Game 6 is almost exclusively the top of the 9th. John Wetteland had walked a tightrope in closing out all three of the Bombers' victories in Atlanta and began the same script in this tilt by coughing up one-out singles to Ryan Klesko and Terry Pendleton. [Major caveat: there's definitely less of a 'feels good' vibe to the 1996 NYY squad in retrospect given that both Rivera and Wetteland proved to be pretty dreadful people.] 

Although Wetteland managed to fan Luis Polonia, he surrendered an RBI knock to Marquis Grissom that put the potential tying runner into scoring position and the go-ahead runner on base. What followed was a tense battle with Mark Lemke, who was fairly inexplicably the Braves' two-hole man, yet a pesky hitter nonetheless. Finally, though, Lemke fouled off a 3-2 pitch that narrowly remained playable, allowing Charlie Hayes to squeeze the final out just in front of fans down the third base line and kicking off an explosive cheer both at Yankee Stadium, as well as in the auxiliary gym. 

However, while the game was over and the TV being wheeled away, the dance continued and my thoughts again began to swirl. At some point, I ran into B who offered me a dance as a thank you for lending her my jacket, but I made up some excuse about my ride saying that we had to leave or something of the like. We did wind up leaving soon afterwards, though, and fortunately Katie and her mom were die-hard Yankees fans, so they happily discussed the World Series title while I furiously tried to remove my tie. When my mom asked how things went, I probably only said that it was 'fine' before heading upstairs to fully change. I lacked the words for what had transpired and really would not find a way to express them to others for a very long time.

Mark Lemke redeem from Ahab

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One night 30 years ago, the New York Yankees finished off the Atlanta Braves in six games, kicking off a dynasty that would include three straight World Series titles from 1998-2000 and two more Fall Classic appearances in 2001/2003.

One night 30 years ago, I realized something about myself that has eventually taken me to where and who I am now - and will always play a background role going forward, too.