Time again for Cubs fans high expectations

Even if the journey is more important than the destination, the Cubs didn’t have to take the goal of ending their World Series drought to such an absurd extreme.

I suggest this the day after the magical day pitchers and catchers reported to Arizona for spring training.

Every warm dawning of a new season now reminds me of that cool afternoon in October 2008, a few hours before the Cubs opened the playoffs against the Dodgers.

Fans hadn’t arrived in Wrigley Field yet, so I sat alone in the grandstands up above the home dugout. A singer/guitar player practiced the national anthem as Cubs coach Ivan DeJesus hit groundballs.

A glance to my right revealed an usher making his way toward the left-field corner where colleagues waited for their game assignments.

The Ancient Usher — that’s how I remember him — looked old enough to have worked the same job in the same ballpark the last time the Cubs won a World Series in 1908.

Or more likely the last time they even played in one in 1945.

The Ancient Usher walked so slowly behind a walker that I wondered whether he would make it the length of the left-field line before the first pitch.

Step by step his progress was measured less in feet than inches, sort of like the Cubs’ slump is measured more in decades than years.

The doggedly noble Ancient Usher started, went a short way, stopped, caught his breath, started again, went a short way, stopped again, caught his breath …

He, I thought, is the Cubs.

Would this super senior ever join his colleagues in time? Will the Cubs ever win a championship in time?

By “in time” I mean during my lifetime.

Remember, 2008 was going to be the year of all years. Instead the Dodgers swept and the Cubs embarked on a new century of futility.

Some think Cal Ripken Jr.’s consecutive games played streak is baseball’s most unbreakable record, and some think Joe DiMaggio’s consecutive games hitting streak is.

Actually it’s the Cubs’ 102 seasons and counting without winning a World Series.

As 2011 spring training commences the Cubs are like that Ancient Usher, still chugging along, struggling and straggling, trying against all odds to get where they want to be.

In Year Two of the Ricketts’ ownership — Year Two must be this season’s marketing slogan — the Cubs can’t escape that this is Year 103 since their last World Series championship.

As Cub pitchers begin practicing pickoffs, rundowns and covering first base, here are the significant Cubs’ questions in terms the Ancient Usher can relate to:

Are the Cubs still at home plate on the journey down the line to a World Series? About at the third-base dugout? Near the home bullpen?

Or, glory be, are the Cubs just steps from their destination in the left-field corner?

For the record, the Ancient Usher did make it all the way down to join his colleagues. One greeted him, took his walker and helped him into a seat.

I considered giving both a standing ovation and spraying them with champagne but that would have been silly in an essentially empty ballpark.

Ah, but imagine the celebration in a packed Wrigley Field if the Cubs ever complete their journey to a World Series.

It won’t happen in my lifetime but, hey, the destination always is something to fantasize about when pitchers and catchers report to camp.

mimrem@dailyherald.com