My first experiences of Shea!

I was born in Sept of '62 in Flushing Hospital. Believe it or not, it was one of the few days that the Mets won a game that year. If you ask my dad, he would tell you that at that point, when they looked out the hospital window you could see Shea Stadium being built. It was at that point they should have known that I would bleed Mets blue and orange. How could I not be a Mets fan?
I have been going to Shea Stadium since 1969. At 6 years old, it was the most exciting night to that point in my life. Since then, I can’t even count how many exciting days and nights I have spent at Shea. I tried to count how many games I have been to at Shea and it came to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 300!
I still remember that first game. It’s one of my first memories in my life. The bright lights, the stadium, all the people, and the aromas all around us was incredible to me. The grass was the greenest grass I had ever seen! There were vendors everywhere selling hot dogs, beer, soda, popcorn, and various souvenirs. My favorite vendors were the ones selling beer by yelling out in their New York accent, “beeah heah, getcha beeah heah!” I had only heard that on the radio listening to games with my brother. We loved to imitate it. Now it was in person! I was in complete awe of everything around me. The stadium seemed so huge to me. It was a bit scary! When the players came out of the dugout in their crisp clean uniforms, they looked like Giants to me, and it wasn’t San Francisco playing that day! We were sitting in field level box seats my dad had gotten from a vendor at work. I still get that same feeling every time I walk into the stadium. It’s a wonderful feeling. I feel like I am at home there.
That night was so special to me. Tom Seaver threw a 1 hitter. The Mets won. It could not have been better. I was hooked! It didn’t hurt that my dad loved the Mets too. He really enjoyed taking me to the games. Although my older brother came along, he was always a Yankee fan (as was my oldest brother). My parents were big Dodger and Giant fans and when they left NY, there was no way my parents would root for the Yankees, so the Mets took their place!