WARNING: This entry might irritate New Yorkers.

BOSTON, MA - "Boston sucks!"

The voice that boomed down upon me from the big man could have elicited a more stylish response. The possibilities include:

The factual: "Is that so? Well, how about those Patriots?"

The foreboding: "Listen - Steinbrenner ruined the Yankees before, and he'll ruin them again."

Or even the advisory: "So don't ever go there [to Boston]."

Unfortunately, I opted for the infantile: "Up yours! New York sucks!"

The big man never even turned around, though one of his friends did, braying like a donkey at my reaction. The wife pleaded with me to calm down, that this display of inter-city rivalry wasn't worth it.

It was in complete contrast to the young black Yankees fan whose path I crossed in Central Park an hour earlier. He had winked at me and smiled wryly. I nodded and smirked at him. We understood. But the big man who accosted me on the corner of 8th and 44th had presumed. And I think that's what pissed me off the most.

My encounters with New Yorkers before this awful incident were distant but polite. And I'll say this much: I don't begrudge born-and-bred New Yorkers their Yankees (or Mets) fanfare. You'd expect that in New York. And I am grateful for true, dyed-in-the-wool New York sports fans. There wouldn't be a great, time-honored rivalry without them.

I wanted to state my case by wearing my Red Sox cap deep in enemy territory. I intended to return the favor for all the Yankees cap-wearing braggadocios that plague my city, i.e. transplanted New Yorkers who live in Boston because it's far cleaner and safer than their own city, even though they'll never admit it. When I last visited New York in October 2000, I hid my Bostonian identity. Ashamed, I had determined that I would not do so this time.

I was not alone. I saw another man at Penn Station and two girls walking along 8th Avenue in front of our hotel decked out in Red Sox gear. I shouted at them, for all to hear, "Spread the faith!" The man and the two girls had gleefully acknowledged my fellow-traveler enthusiasm. This was what it was all about - reminding New Yorkers of our presence and that we can be every bit as tenacious as them. The black dude in Central Park got the point and accepted it gracefully. The white-trash asshole on 8th Avenue clearly didn't.

I didn't intend to piss off New Yorkers. I wanted to simply make a point. And, given the plentitude and multitude of other sports team caps I noticed during my weekend tenure in America's largest city, I knew I was far from alone in conforming to New York culture - the depths of which I don't care to plumb. Suffice to say, one man's culture in New York is another man's confrontation.