Extremely Perplexed Rich People (at Fenway)

When C. and I arrived at our free Loge Box seats at Fenway last night, we found a family of four already occupying them. The father, expecting thus inevitable moment, stepped forward and offered to exchange his tickets with ours. "I don't care about the game," he said in a British or Australian accent. "I just want to keep the family together." He pointed out where his own seats were: just behind the Red Sox dugout. In disbelief, I asked to see the tickets. Sure enough, they were real, field box tickets. We made the swap and headed down to the seats, eight rows off the field.

Upon entering the Field Box, we noticed a change in the atmosphere of the park. No longer was I taunted but rather questioned for wearing a Mets shirt. The crowd was very subdued, with a far lower percentage of fans wearing fan gear. "What is your connection to the Mets?" asked a day-trader looking guy, sitting with a friend wearing a $200 play shirt and $500 watch. "How did you get these tickets?" asked an older couple who manner and clean appearance felt very Cape Cod. Another gentleman, a veteran of "the tennis business," claimed that we would not "have much to worry about" being Mets fans in this section. "It's very corporate down here."

And it was. It was the Acela crowd transplaced into Fenway. And they couldn't understand how we had gotten there (or how we could be older than 17). The nice couple we sat next to even asked to see our tickets.

It was a strange experience, made more rewarding by the Mets' 5-3 victory.