My Old Red Sox Cap

Wearing the hat - Karluk One excavation mid 1980s

The Alutiiq Museum is in the process of publishing a book about the Karluk One excavation.  So I have been going through old photos from the dig looking for suitable images.  This was the dig that first brought me to Alaska in 1985, and I have enjoyed finding some serious 'blasts from the past' - photos that strike a memory chord.  A couple days ago I found this one of me in a Boston Red Sox cap.

I was a serious Red Sox fan and wore that hat until the red was pink and the blue faded.  In the photo the hat looks almost brand new, but I later took that hat with me to Africa and I dipped it in every major river or ocean that I ever visited.  It has been dipped in the Indian Ocean, and the Zambezi and Mississippi Rivers among other bodies of water.  I wore the hat while waiting in line for over 40 hours to buy Red Sox tickets in 1986.  A photo of me sleeping in the hat even made it into the Boston Globe. I still have the hat somewhere about the house.

I always used to wear the hat when the Red Sox were in the playoffs.  It was supposed to help them win.  And yet they always lost.  Ironically, ever since I stopped wearing it they have actually been winning championships (2004 and 2007).  Now it seems everybody BUT me is wearing a Red Sox cap.  I very much want the Red Sox to win, and so I did not even dare make this post prior last night.  And last night they won it all.

This afternoon I'll have to look around for the hat.

Patrick