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*I'll apologize in advance, this wasn't meant to be so long. This is what a trip down memory lane always does to me.*


I was born and lived my first six years in Bedford Heights. Lost my dad, a die-hard fan, at the age of two. Lost my mom at the age of six.

Then on to Cleveland, being raised by my half-brother and sister-in-law. He didn't care for sports, so it wasn't until he was long gone and my sister-in-law (by then, my "mom") was remarried, that I had an actual step-dad who was a passionate Browns fan.

Before they were married, my "mom" introduced him to my (real) dad via an 8mm film from years before. We watched my dad's recording from the ending minutes of our Championship against the Lions (1954) in Municipal Stadium. It was the first time I actually shed tears watching that "filmstrip". I didn't say anything, but they weren't tears for my dad, they were for the young boy next to him, frozen in time in those frames. I was finally old enough to do the math and experience the gravity of knowing that was his oldest son (from another marriage) who had drowned with him on that fateful fishing trip in Canada.



It was only a few weeks later that step-dad was taking me to my first game. Browns / Bengals 1978. As an 11 year old, the craziest memories of that day were: piss troughs in the bathrooms; Hell's Angels roaming the aisles looking for someone; some crazed Browns fan marching around trying to get anyone to bet him $10 dollars that we lose, after we had scored our only 10 points in the 4th to tie the game (everyone seemed sure we would lose, I didn't yet know the same BBS they did)... and then finally, the Don Cockroft FG in overtime... and the roar of the 80,000+ that had me hooked. for. life.

Although by high-school I was moving on to another family situation, I cherish growing up on the East side of Cleveland. 71st and Gertrude (couple streets over from Fleet). A Polish neighborhood where everyone took care of each other. We played hard from early in the day 'til sundown. Usually football, usually on the grounds of Fullerton Elementary. The school cafeteria was open all summer with free breakfast for kids. I can't count the times my friends and I would be there for breakfast and then go on to play football all day. Limping home with some blood stains and a little sunburn wasn't all that uncommon.

From a kid on the playground, to a young man getting "bussed" to Jr High in "the hood", Cleveland never scared or intimidated me, because I was Cleveland. Not even walking through that hood, hand in hand with my girlfriend, both of us getting it from all angles... because she was black and I was white. As segregated as the city was, it was still a "melting pot". As much as people liked to portray things as black and white, with no room for gray, my friends were black and white, we played in their neighborhood and they played in ours. All you needed in those days was someone to walk up by your side and introduce you as their friend. I'm not saying that was the experience for everyone, but that was ours.



The Browns still had stiff competition in my heart though. My first love was boxing. My second love was the Cavs as my step-mom's best friend was dating a player. I woke up one night to see *most* of the 75-76 Cavs starters sitting in my living room passing a joint at 2am. I had all of their autographs and went to a playoff game against the Bullets during that Cinderella journey.

And the Indians... thinking back to those days, one memory that always comes quickly is the transistor radio that went with me everyday on my paper route. It was always tuned in to the Tribe or Cleveland sports radio. I knew every player stat, dug into every box score if I didn't see or hear the game, I bled Cleveland Indians baseball. That green, dirty, transistor radio makes one of it's most famous cameos one evening in May, 1981... as it lands on the dining room table and I race into the living room, trading in Herb Score and Nev Chandler for Joe Tait and Bruce Drennan, and the 9th inning of Lenny Barker's perfect game on channel 43.



The "johnny-come-lately" Browns quickly dealt plenty of heartache. I had my radio, but had to break away from my step-mom to chase down the wall of 20" TVs in an Uncle Bill's department store -- just in time to see Ahmad Rashad's one-handed catch under an expired clock. I actually lost $5 of my paper route profits on a bet with my step-dad (he always knew when the Browns would lose, even in games that we spent 60 full minutes with the lead). Three weeks later, I trudged through the wind and snow to go to a friend's house and watch Red Right 88 end our Cardiac Kids.

I think there was already enough Cleveland sports heartbreak to know this would be a long journey. I had no idea it would be this long.



I'm "tied" to Cleveland. At times the ties seem more like chains. But it doesn't matter, I'm a willing prisoner. Being a Browns fan is truly Stockholm Syndrome explained in it's purest form. Doesn't matter how bad the teams are or how much farther I am along this road we call life -- when my feet hit the ground in Cleveland -- I'm home. The home that has stood the truest test of time in my long and winding road.

I just hope I'm still here for "that day". It's sad and funny and so improbable. It's to be made fun of by the rest of the world while we don't even care that we're the brunt. We still wear the colors with pride and will stick a fat middle finger in the face of anyone with a smirk. I never, ever envisioned, as a young Browns fan that the fast-forward in my filmstrip would (will) have me looking straight to the sky when the day comes, saying "this is for dad, this is for Ricky, this is for Matt, this is for Dave"... and on and on, right through eotab.


No one else, in no other place on earth, will have even the slightest chance of understanding the feeling.