7 Games, 10 innings, 1 Champion. Fireworks erupt and people storm the streets. Horns from cars are blaring as the city that has waited for 108 years awakens. The Cubs have won the World Series! Our beloved Cubbies have done it! “What Goat, what Curse!?” So many people say because it no longer is relevant. Strangers high-five each other as they walk by screaming, “Yay Cubs!” Cops honk their horns and hug patrons from all walks of life, because that night no one cared what you looked like or where you were from, all we cared about was that our shared hope and love for the Cubs shined through.
The city of Chicago needed the Cubs to win. Most may not know it but they did. We needed something so great and impossibly possible to united the city, even if it wasn’t for a long period of time. Most of the time in the news we hear about the violence involving cops, innocent people, and the many shootings that happen in our city; but since November 2nd the Cubs have filled our hearts, minds, and newsstands. Now I’m not ignorant I know there was still some arrests and violence this past week, but for once it was not our city’s focus or out news’s focus. We took a break from the gloom and doom and made room for the cheers and celebrations for the history being made that night.
The back half of this past week all you saw were the Cubs on the billboards, papers, and on the majority of people’s shirts. It’s a refreshing thing to see instead of the election. We needed a break from the craziness that is the election. The lies, racism, and ignorance that is our election has consumed so many people’s minds and thoughts the past several months; but when the Cubs won it gave us something better to talk and think about. Instead talking about emails and walls, we have been talking about Ross, Bryant, Rizzo, and Fowler. We are storming the streets in celebration and holding up signs that have “Cleveland blew a 3-1 lead” or “It took 108 years” instead of signs in protest to certain candidates’ ideas or views.
For these reasons I must say, from the bottom of my heart and so many others, “Thank you Cubs for not sucking.” Thank you for giving our city something to celebrate, something record-breaking better than how many homicides in one month. An incredible event that shut down streets, classes, and schools to give us the time to celebrate with you all. Thank you for uniting a city that has been battling itself for so long. By flooding the city with the color blue this entire past week it has brought tears of joy, smiles, and so much cheers of victory to a city that needed it. Now I know it sadly won’t stay like this and that soon the usual reoccurring events will be back on everyone’s minds, but to have this break and this chance to feel so awake and alive is incredible. “Hey, Chicago what do you say? The Cubs are gonna win today.”