Cubs win! Cubs win! Cubs win!

I woke up on Thursday morning with a couple of pretty sore fingers. I guess that’s what I get for biting my nails down to the quick.

I’ve been biting my nails for over 40 years. I’ve tried to stop but it’s no use. My dad once tried to break me of the habit by making me soak my fingers in rubbing alcohol at night, thinking the bitterness would prevent me from putting my fingertips in my mouth.

It didn’t work and I was probably the only kid at Cloud Spring Elementary who came to school with my breath reeking like I’d just come off a threeday bender.

I bite them when I’m bored and I bite them when I’m nervous and Wednesday night, it was definitely nerves.

The Chicago Cubs were playing in Game 7 of the World Series, trying to snap a 108-year World Series drought and here we were going into the 10th inning.

It was almost 12:15 a.m. and here I was, sitting on my bed with only the TV on, doing my best to not wake my wife, who lasted into the ninth before taking herself out of the game. I had been rocking back-and-forth while she was still half-awake, but I was trying to be a good husband and be as still as possible, knowing she was the one that had to wake up early, so I resorted to fingernails.

By the time I ran out of fingernails to chew on, the Cubs were one out away from clinching the title. I got up and stood in front of the TV in anticipation of the final out. I didn’t know how I was going to celebrate, I just knew it needed to be as quietly and calmly as humanly possible.

I can’t remember being that nervous watching a baseball game before, not even in Game 7 of the 1991 World Series or Game 6 of the 1995 World Series. Those were the two most memorable World Series games ever that involved the Atlanta Braves (whom I like to refer to as my ex-girlfriend). I wasn’t even that nervous in Game 7 of the 2001 Series between New York and Arizona.

At least in my case, the Braves were that longtime steady girlfriend you kept

taking back after she did you wrong a few times and the Diamondbacks were that hot, 20-something yoga instructor you met in line at Starbucks one day and began having a fling with just to make your ex mad after you finally broke it off with her.

But then there’s the Cubs. The Cubs are that girl you grew up with, went to school with, loved like a sister and was always your friend. And years later, it finally hits you how beautiful she turned out to be and you realize that she’s always been there for you and you discover she’s single and has had a huge crush on you for years so you finally start dating her and realize she was the one for you all along.

The beginning of my love affair with the Cubs began about the same time I really discovered and began following Major League Baseball. It was some 35 or more years ago when my family finally got cable television for the very first time. We went from three channels to 11 and it was (at the time) the greatest day of my life.

One of the two new channels we got was WTBS, the SuperStation, out of Atlanta. That channel introduced me, not only to the Braves, but also to Georgia Championship Wrestling, starting yet another love affair.

The other channel was WGN out of Chicago. That station is memorable to me for three things: 1. The Bozo the Clown Show (and the Grand Prize Game), 2. “800588-2300, Em-Pire!”, the still-in-use-today jingle for the Northlake, Illinois-based home improvement and home furnishing company, and 3. Cubs games.

My summers were pretty much spent playing outside before watching Cubs’ games in the afternoon and before watching Braves’ games at night. I can still quote the batting orders of both of those teams for most of the 1980’s.

My break-up with the Braves after the 1997 season has been welldocumented in these columns over the years, but like I said, the Cubs were always there for me. Maybe it was the day games, or the history, or the nostalgia, or the mystique that has always surrounded the Cubs and Wrigley Field. Heck, maybe it was just

Harry Caray on the mic.

Whatever the reason, I became a Cubs fan and have remained one to this day. Seeing them lose to San Diego in the 1984 NLCS broke my heart. My joy in seeing them beat the Braves in the 2003 divisional series was erased by the Florida Marlins one round later and I suffered more heartbreak last fall when they couldn’t get by the Mets in the NLCS.

But I knew 2016 would be the year things would be different. I knew coming into the season that they had the best team in baseball and I wrote a preseason column predicting a World Series title this year. No more curses. No more excuses.

So with the clock approaching 12:45 a.m. on Wednesday, and me standing in front of the TV ready to explode, the never-saydie Cleveland Indians drew a two-out walk. Then stole a base. Then singled in a run to bring the potential gamewinning run to the plate as they looked to break their own 68-year World Series drought.

So I did the one thing I knew I had to do. I quietly and gently as possible sat back down on the edge of the bed, being careful not

to disturb my sleeping wife. You see, standing up had obviously screwed up the Cubs’ mojo and I had to remedy the situation immediately.

I sat down as Mike Montgomery entered the game to pitch. Two curveballs later, third baseman Kris Bryant scooped up a ground ball and fired across the diamond to Anthony Rizzo at first to end the game.

And my body started to shake. From crying.

I thought about all those Cubs’ games I watched growing up. I fondly thought back to the day in 2012 when I got to take a train to the stadium, tour Wrigley Field and see a Cubs’ game in person for the first time. The same day I got to run the bases at Wrigley like a little kid. The Cubs beat the Astros that day, 4-0, but Chicago went on to lose 101 games that season.

Now here they were four years later. 103 regular season wins. 11 more in the postseason. The best team in baseball. No more close calls. No more heartbreak.

I just laid back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling and shedding tears of relief and happiness as the body vibrations continued, which of

course woke up my wife.

“What happened?” she mumbled sleepily.

“They won,” I said softly. “It actually happened. The Cubs won the World Series.” “Are you crying?” “Yeah. I just never thought I’d ever see it.”

“Well, if you want to get up and yell, go ahead. I’ll let you.”

I didn’t take her up on the offer. Instead, I got up and walked down the hall and into my darkened living room where I raised both hands toward the ceiling and gave one final giant (but silent) fist pump.

I spent the next two hours reveling in the win and watching postgame coverage on TV until I finally fell asleep sometime around 3 a.m. In the next four hours that followed, I woke up twice, worried that it had all been a dream. But both times I heard the familiar strains of “Go Cubs Go” coming out of the TV. I pinched myself, smiled and went back to sleep.

Pitchers and catchers will report for Spring Training in a little less than three months. Who knows what will happen in the 2017 season. The Cubs might slide back toward the rest of the National League or maybe this really is the start of

the next great baseball dynasty.

For me, though, it doesn’t really matter. Sure, I’d love to see the Cubs go on and win many more pennants and many more World Series titles. But I saw the one. The one that matters the most. The one I could only dream about for years.

Some people have actually suggested that winning the World Series will take away from the Cubs’ history and legacy. They think that the Cubs will now shed their “Loveable Losers” persona and lose their identity. Those people are morons.

Win or lose, the Cubs will always be the Cubs to those of us who call ourselves their fans. The team’s legacy will never die out. Its history will never change. The 2016 team just simply added another chapter to the love story that has lasted for well over a century.

And even with sore fingertips, the 2016 team has given me a chance to type a sentence I wondered if I’d ever get a chance to type:

“The Chicago Cubs are the World Champions.”

Holy Cow! It just doesn’t get any better than that.

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