Okay, baseball fans, the World Series is over and the New York Yankees have reclaimed their rightful place as world champions and the path of the parallel universe that the world has been traveling through since 2001 has been corrected.
Once again we are on axis in the proper dimension where angles are not skewed and the natural laws that govern our small patch of time and space are not suspended. As so succinctly stated by John Sterling, the radio voice of the Yankees, "Ballgame over, World Series over, The Yankees win, Thaaaaaaaa Yankees win!"
Back On Top
The Yankees franchise is not only the most successful sports franchise in history, but since the inception of The World Series in 1903 they are the most successful baseball franchise, with 27 World Series championships and 40 American league titles to their name. As a Yankee fan it's great to be on top, and while it may be true that they spend the most money in baseball, the most money spent does not ensure the best team bought. Case in point; regardless of all the seasons that the Yankees had the number one payroll in baseball and despite the enormous sums spent on the individual great players there were still fallow years for the team. Therefore, the conclusion I come to, much to the chagrin of all Yankee-haters, is that there must be something other than the largest payroll in baseball that accounts for the Yankees' success.
Before I start revealing these great secrets I must first qualify my writing by letting you know that what I am about to divulge is completely accurate and true as it is first-hand information that was given to me by aliens from the planet Orion after they abducted me and took me to their base in the Aleutian Islands. What I am about to relate to you lay buried in my subconscious for years, and regrettably, I did not begin to recall any of it until I stopped taking my meds – at which time the memories came flooding back.
Down to Earth
My story begins in 1961 while the Yankees were in pursuit of their 19th World Series title. I was only 10 at the time and the Yankees had just clinched the pennant when the aliens came and whisked me away to their Aleutian Islands hideaway. Unlike other accounts of abduction there is no horror or fear attached to my story. The aliens were all very hospitable and congenial and despite some condescending remarks by a few of them they were remarkably – how shall I put it…down to earth? There were no cold operating tables, probing of orifices or implantations of any kind. On the contrary, we all sat around a glowing, heat-giving orb (it's cold in the Aleutian Islands), drinking what seemed to be a hot chocolate beverage. The beverage induced a warm euphoric feeling in me and though I was still very young it made me remember ahead to the future and reminded me of an enjoyable cocktail party with friends, albeit grey, bug-eyed friends.
It was great fun learning how to communicate telepathically and I believe that they imparted some great wisdom to me, although for the life of me I still cannot remember what it was. Something about astronomy, calendars and the year 2012, but it was all a bit confusing in my hot chocolate daze so, without confusing me anymore than need be, the alien who appeared to be the leader changed the subject to something I knew about, The Yankees. Turns out that each and every one of the aliens is a big Yankee fan and had been for years. All of the aliens could recite (telepathically) statistics for every player from the inception of the game through the last year the game would ever be played. That's right, they knew the very last year of baseball. As the aliens explained it to me for them there is no past, present or future and unlike humans who live a linear life in a three dimensional world, their lives are governed by a different set of physics. The one thing that they do share with humans is their love for baseball.
Good vs. Evil
Apparently, baseball is a form of warfare played in the higher realms of existence by what one could call the forces of good and evil and, while refilling my hot chocolate, the aliens made clear to me that "As goes the world goes baseball." In 1903 the first World Series was won by the Boston Pilgrims. From 1903 through 1912 the country was headed by first, Teddy Roosevelt (R) and then William Taft (R). From 1913 until March of 1921 Woodrow Wilson (D) led the country, but it wasn't until the 1921 season, when Warren Harding (R) was President that the New York Yankees even played in a World Series match-up and they lost that one to the New York Giants. As a note, Harding died in office in August 1921 and his Vice President Calvin Coolidge (R) took over the job as President. Other than Eisenhower, Coolidge would be the only sitting Republican President to see the Yankees win three world series. That said, 1922 also saw a Yankees-Giants series and once again the Giants were victorious, but the forces above took notice and by 1923, one of the major cosmic forces aligned itself with the Yankees and for the next 77 years battled the other cosmic force which was expressed through the other teams.
It would be presumptuous to assume that that the force representing the Yankees is the force of good and even though the aliens are die-hard Yankee fans they would not tell me which force manifested itself through the Yankees. Maybe it's for the best or they just don't know, but they did tell me to follow politics and world events in correlation to baseball. I asked them to be more specific, but the warmth of the orb was fading and they did not refill my cup of hot chocolate. All they would say is, "It's not what you do, but what you do with it."
The next thing I knew I woke up back in my own bed in 1961. That year the Yankees went on to beat the Cincinnati Reds 4-1 in the World Series, John F. Kennedy (D) was President and would be president when the Yankees won again in 1962. By November 1963 Kennedy was no longer with us and the Yankees would not win again until 1977 when Jimmy Carter (D) was Commander and Chief. As a point of interest, The Yankees won 19 of their championships while a Democrat was the president of The United States, with only eight wins coming during a Republican White House. The most Yankee championship wins came during The Roosevelt/Truman years between 1936 and 1952. They did not win a championship during Lyndon Johnson's (D) presidency or during the Richard Nixon (R) years and during the 12 years in which Ronald Reagan (R) and the first Bush (R) controlled the White House there was not a single championship won by the Yankees. During the eight years of Bill Clinton's (D) White House tenure the Yankees won four Championship seasons, which was followed by another eight losing seasons during George W. Bush's (R) occupancy of the White House.
A Matter of Perspective
We all know the outcome of the 2009 series and we know who is sitting in the Oval Office at present time, but neither fact can be considered good or evil since the aliens were very clear in not telling me which force was made manifest through the Yankees. Obviously it is one or the other depending upon which side of the fence one may sit, but how one ends up aligning themselves is just a matter of choice and perspective. After all, one of the more important life lessons that we learn is to discern good from evil. From what I've read, good resides in a higher realm while we are left wallowing in the temptations of the earthly, evil inclination. Regardless of good or evil or right or wrong, there are things that I enjoy in this corporal world such as music, audio, guitars, hot chocolate, family, kids, fine wine, carnal relations, a good single malt scotch and baseball, though not necessarily in that order. We all learn from the things that we enjoy doing and hopefully we are capable of applying and carrying over each lesson from one to the other. Understanding leads to wisdom and it's these insights that help one become a better engineer, guitarist or oeneologist. Much like the Yankees in relation to politics, each piece is part of the whole, which helps us understand the other. Remember, according to my chocolate drinking, orb loving aliens "It's not what you do, but what you do with it."
