Well, I never thought I would resort to it, but for the first time in my life I am going to send out one of those "holiday letters"… I've always been against it because they seem to me to be somewhat self-serving (no offense to anyone that does this)... And, sure enough, you'll see by the nature and tone of my letter, mine is all about me, my family, and my "lifestyle"… Hope I haven't scared you off just yet; here goes:

The year 2004 started off for me like many other New Year's Days I've had in the past. That is, I was in a complete fog. Except this time, it had NOT been alcohol induced. Instead, I had been in a REAL coma since late October, 2003. The last thing I remembered doing was watching Game 6 of the 2003 ALCS. So, as you can imagine, after being "gone" for over 2 months I almost relapsed into my vegetative state when I learned that the Red Sox had actually LOST that game and hence the series to the dreaded Yankees. Something about Pedro being left in too long ??? It's still somewhat unclear to me what happened that fateful night. Anyways, this is NOT about the Red Sox, it's about my family, so let me get started…

In January, my oldest son turned 8 years old. Poor kid loves the Red Sox, but as I thought at the time, he will never see a World Series Championship. Maybe I should encourage education as an alternative to him. Maybe. In February, yours truly turned the BIG 4-0. That's right, my fortieth birthday just happened to be on Super Bowl Sunday. Sure, I could have been selfish and indulged in a trip to Houston to see the Patriots win their 2nd title in 3 years, but even on that cold winter day, my thoughts kept turning to spring training and the Red Sox. Would Curt Schilling and Keith Foulke make THAT much of a difference ??? Nah, I thought, Schilling's injury prone and Foulke's ball doesn't have enough movement on it, right ???

My youngest son turned 5 in May. Not only does he like the Sox, but he HATES the Yankees. He thinks our relatives from New Jersey are EVIL because they root for the Yankees. He feels the same way about George Bush (no lie), but that's a story for another day. Anyway, I thought at the time about raising him as a Yankees fan to let him have some peace and happiness in his life. Poor kid has no future, as a sports fan, I mean.

My middle son, well he's another story. The kid HATES sports. He doesn't like playing them, talking about them, or even watching them, but, for some STRANGE reason, he LOVES the Yankees. Jorge Posada is his favorite player. Smartest person in our family because his life is going to be filled with winning, success, and prosperity, or so I thought when he turned 7 in July.

Oh yeah, back to my family. We did manage to squeeze in a vacation to Cape Cod. Of course, the first HOUR we arrived happened to be the trading deadline and I soon learned that NOMAHHHHH had been traded for a couple of gloves named Orlando Cabrera and Doug Stink-a-witch. Man, this had the makings of ruining my whole summahhh, let alone the family vacation.

My bride of 11 years turned 41 at the end of August. Yes, she's older than me and obviously wiser since she pointed out to me that the Red Sox were STARTING to play better, and that defense, timely hitting, and starting pitching are all you need to win a championship. Yup, she's the 2nd smartest person in the family. She even started to call me Big Papi, at least I thought she was talking about me.

This wasn't supposed to be about the Red Sox, but about my family, but what can you do ??? The wife and 3 kids are wonderful. Everyone's happy and healthy, and on October 27th, 2004, I'm proud to say we gave birth to the newest member of our family, a…

WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONSHIP TEAM !!!

God bless you and your families during the holiday season. May 2005 be as bountiful as this historical year.

You can email Jack at jacksox@walpole.org