April 27, 2010

You’re looking at my daughter, Elsa (see my previous Wall of Paul post), who recently started insisting she wear her “Chief Wahoo” jacket and baseball cap whenever we leave the apartment. At this point, some of you may be wondering how the Cleveland Indians could possibly lose this year when they have fans as cute as Elsa promoting the cause. If you’re a real Tribe supporter like I am, though, you know the answer to that one is, “Oh, quite easily.”

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I was cute once, too, goddammit, and the Indians have not won the World Series since I’ve been alive, not to mention for several seasons preceding my sorry existence. Just to illustrate, the last time the Tribe walked away with the ring, this is what a TV set looked like.

That’s a 1948 Hallicrafter model 505, with a newfangled 7-inch electrostatic deflection tube. Only rich, forward-thinking people had such a contraption in 1948, which means the only Clevelanders who actually saw the Indians’ historic final out were sitting at the stadium when it happened. Harry Truman was the president of the United States that evening, and the first McDonalds franchise wouldn’t open for another four years. Zippers had not yet been invented.

Okay, I made up the zipper thing. But you get the picture. The Indians haven’t landed a world championship for 62 years. In fact, the closest they’ve come to winning one is losing one in the 11th inning of game seven, to a four year-old expansion team wearing pastel colors (That would be the Florida Marlins in 1997, for you misery buffs out there.) Just to be clear, the Indians won't be taking it this year, either, unless a particularly virulent strain of malaria decimates roughly 14 professional baseball teams.

One can only hope.

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So, to be honest, I don’t know how I feel about Elsa’s sudden embrace of Wahoo-ism. It could well be that she simply digs the hat because her daddy wears one like it much of the time— I’m not altogether sure she even knows what baseball is, and she won’t be learning from this year’s Indians.

However, since my son, Jack, is above the fray and gives every impression that he’ll never care much about the Tribe one way or the other - and I’m perfectly cool with that - I wouldn’t mind if Elsa cared a little. I just wonder if I’m being a good parent when I encourage it. After all, it’s one thing to teach a child that winning isn’t everything, but quite another to suggest that winning is virtually impossible.

Still, though. That's some kid.

Paul Tatara