A Celebration of Boston, in Santa Monica
When I was 16 years old, about a week or two after the planes crashed into the twin towers in 2001, I went to a Red Sox game with my father and my little brother. My father refused to give the tickets away, even though the Sox weren't playing well and fear was high.
Bianca Lapin The Servideo brothers, who helped organized the event, outside the bar
On Yawkey Way, the famous street outside of Fenway Park, I watched Massholes in Nomar jerseys, chomping down Italian sausages and washing them down with wicked cold beers. It just seemed so easy, then, for a man wearing a vest filled with explosives to blow us all to smithereens. That day, I had never seen Fenway so empty or heard such a small amount of cursing. During the third inning, my father got up to go to the bathroom, and he whispered to me: "If anything happens, run with your brother onto the field. Everyone will be running the opposite direction."
Last Monday, when the bombs exploded at the Boston Marathon, it was the realization of a terror I had expected, really, since 2002. But this time, I was so far away from my hometown in Worcester County, living in Los Angeles. And I wanted to know how Bostonians were dealing with the recent events. I wanted to feel a part of my community. And I wanted to know if anything has changed.
So on Sunday, I went down to Sonny McLean's Irish Pub -- a Boston bar -- in Santa Monica for the Rally for Boston. It was a party. When I walked into the bar, it was as if I had been transported back to the East Coast: The Sox game was on almost every television, a band was leading the bar through Neil Diamond's Sweet Caroline, and the bartenders were passing out beers and shots of whiskey as if it was the end of prohibition.
More »



































