Summers in the the early 2000s were the best time for a kid like me to grow up. In those days my biggest problem in life was the beauty mark on my toe that I wanted to get rid of. And the most excitement I had was when my Dad would drive me to Little League games and then afterwards we would stop at Burger King to get chicken nuggets. In those days there was no such thing as mobile phone connected to the WiFi, so families spent more time in each others' presence. And in those days my entire family would get together for a family vacation down the Jersey Shore for two weeks every summer.
While the first few days would be just my immediate family, my grandparents would come up to visit for a few days. At the time the most fun I had was burying my brother in the sand and playing with my Papa Biagio's beauty mark on his chest. He would be sitting in the chair watching TV with his shirt off and I would sneak up on him and try to pull it off. I hated birthmarks. My grandfather found it funny and he would just play along and laugh about it. After a few days, my grandparents would return home and I wouldn't have to pick at anyone's birthmarks.
A few days later, I remember my Dad receiving a call and then telling me that we had to drive back home even though I knew we were supposed to be at the shore house for another week. We were driving the car home when, in a saddened voice, my Dad told me, "You don't understand it yet, but we lost a great man today."
At 8 years old, I realized my Dad was right, I had no idea what was going on or what actually happened. It turned out my Papa Biagio suffered a heart attack and died while sitting at his kitchen table. Just a few days ago he was vacationing with his family and then a short period after he was no longer with us.
Looking back at my memories of my grandfather I have a few hazy memories but there is one thing that I am certain of: he loved the cubs. In honor of my Papa Biagio, my Dad and I cheered for the Cubs to win the World Series in 2003. However, as all baseball fans know, Steve Bartman interfered with their chances of winning the World Series. After the Cubs lost a 3-1 lead to the Marlins that year I remember my Dad used to joke that my Papa Biagio would have gone crazy if he saw how the Cubs lost.
Fast-forward 13 years later to 2016 and the Cubs have won the World Series for the first time in more than a century. While it has always been unclear to me why my Papa Biagio would root for a team that had not won a World Series for more than 100 years and not the Yankees like the rest of our family, as a young kid, I still thought it was cool that he liked the Cubs. As a New York Yankees fan, I knew nothing about the Cubs except Sammy Sosa, who I always picked in the computer baseball game Backyard Baseball. But I hit a lot of home-runs with him in the game and I loved how he pumped his chest two times and then blew a kiss to sky; I just liked Derek Jeter more.
For whatever reason my Papa Biagio had, he was an avid Cubs fan. So when the Cubs finally win it all, I know that a ton of Cubs fans were finally relieved from the century old "curse" — and my Papa Biagio was watching down and smiling in heaven.
