Why We Live Here
1. Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. Or ignores you altogether.
2. Patriot's Day.
3. The reflection of Trinity Church on the Hancock Tower.
4. Europe — six hours, no stopovers.
5. The wicked ooawesom accent.
6. Titian's Europa at the Gardner Museum.
7. Tip O'Neill was one of us.
8. Game Six, 1975.
9. Game Six, 1986.
10. The Curse of the Bambino. It gives us a scapegoat.
11. Steven Tyler's lips.
12. The state university president's brother is a fugitive mobster, and other political absurdities.
13. Paul Revere, John Hancock, Samuel Adams — the patriots.
14. Tom Brady, Ty Law, Adam Vinatieri — the Patriots.
15. Frappes.
16. Jimmies.
17. Thoreau's woods are only 25 minutes from the city.
18. That first day of spring.
19. Salem Street. It's Hanover Street without the tourists.
20. Hanover Street.
21. Tracy Chapman started here. Britney Spears didn't.
22. Bitching about the Big Dig.
23. We don't waste taxpayer money on road signs.
24. The shot heard round the world.
25. The Kennedys, love 'em or hate 'em.
26. Brigham's chocolate ice cream.
27. “More Than a Feeling,” the anthem Americans made out to in their shag-carpeted basements in the '70s, recorded in a shag-carpeted basement in Boston by the band Boston.
28. The Beanpot.
29. Ralph Waldo Emerson was one of us.
30. Newbury Street.
31. Matt and Ben. How d'ya like them apples?
32. Microbrews.
33. The Emerald Necklace.
34. Malcolm X was a busboy and Ho Chi Minh was a baker at the Parker House.
35. “Cold tea” in Chinatown after closing time.
36. Fall foliage.
37. Hopkinton to Boston, 26.2.
38. “Havlicek stole the ball.”
39. A hot dog and vanilla soft-serve in a cone on Castle Island.
40. Edward Hopper's Drug Store at the MFA.
41. Route 1.
42. Shakespeare on the Common.
43. “Dirty Water” by the Standells. What other town in America would embrace a song about a polluted river?
44. The Head of the Charles.
45. Sunday brunch, the South End.
46. Filene's Basement.
47. Mount Auburn Cemetery.
48. Chowdah.
49. Wally's, the Middle East, TT's, the Paradise, the Orpheum, Passim.
50. The Mighty Mighty Bosstones.
51. Channel 2.
52. Buzzy's Roast Beef.
53. Jacqueline Bouvier married one of us.
54. So did Paulina Porizkova.
55. Architectural distinctiveness in a strip mall nation.
56. Jack, Kack, Lack, Mack, Nack, Ouack, Pack, and Quack.
57. Click and Clack.
58. Drivers vs. pedestrians.
59. The acoustics in Symphony Hall.
60. All those students. They keep the city young.
61. The summer — when the students are gone.
62. A Guinness at Doyle's.
63. Riviera wannabe sunbathers on the Esplanade.
64. Fenway.