It is 9:13 PM Central Time. I am sitting at my desk in New Orleans, Louisiana, and if I am to believe what I am seeing unfold in front of my very eyes, the world that I have known and believed in all my life is about to slip away. I have just run the numbers based upon the most recent projections on the New York Times website and it appears most likely that by the time the final tallies are counted on the West Coast and in Hawaii that Donald Trump will be the next president of the United States.   Somewhere, deep down in the most rational recesses of my brain, I guess I always knew that this was a possibility but I never allowed myself to believe that it would actually happen. Now I am faced—we are all faced—with the reality that the American Dream is over. Dead and gone.

Today, Gentle Reader(s), is a truly beautiful day. It is a day the likes of which long-suffering fans of a certain Midwestern baseball club have not known for 108 years. It is with almost giddy incredulity that Your Humble Narrator reaffirms to himself that the Cubs have won the 2016 World Series. This is a day that I had longed hoped for but perhaps never quite allowed myself to fully believe would actually arrive. But last night, at exactly 10:47 PM Mountain Standard Time, in the bottom of a rain-delayed 10th inning, rookie Cleveland infielder Michael Martinez tapped a soft ground ball off of Cubs reliever Mike Montgomery to third baseman Kris Bryant who tossed the ball straight and true to Anthony Rizzo on first to seal the deal: Cubs win, 8-7. Just like that—over a century of angst, frustration, curses (imaginary or otherwise) and ‘woulda coulda shoulda’ second guessing, banished. This. Actually. Happened. It was a moment I’ll never forget.