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You can't live in the Boston area for fifteen minutes without becoming a Red Sox fan.

It's part of the air, I guess. Come spring, once the last hump of snow has melted from the parking lots, everybody breathes in baseball. And, all too often, agonizing frustration.

I lived just outside Boston for a dozen years, starting in 1959. The very first day I arrived in the area the Red Sox had an impact on me.

I got swamped in the traffic exiting a Bosox game; nearly ran out of gas while trying to find my way through the tidal wave of cars.

In the late 1950s and early '60s the Red Sox were so bad that you could walk into Fenway Park off the street and buy a box seat right over the home team's dugout. Which I did, fairly often.

The team was lethargic. Sure, they had Ted Williams in left field, playing out the end of his brilliant career. I saw Ted at bat against Bobby Shantz of the Philadelphia Athletics once. Shantz threw a pitch that looked like it was aimed at Ted's ear. He fell backward to avoid getting hit by the pitch. As he did so, the curve broke sharply over the plate. As Ted was falling down, he flicked his bat and drove the ball over second base. He had to get up off the seat of his pants to run out a single.

That was a hitter. But the rest of the team wasn't very exciting. For several years the Red Sox management had been trying to make a major league shortstop out of a young man named Don Buddin. He would make spectacular diving plays in the infield, then let an easy ground ball dribble between his legs.

The Boston fans were vociferous, and showed a lot more hustle than the Red Sox infield. There was one guy in particular with a foghorn voice; he always sat behind home plate. I learned something important from him.

As the game moved into the late innings and the Red Sox infield seemed to be dozing off in the afternoon sun, this fan would start to bellow,"Do something! Even if it's wrong, do something." That advice stood me in good stead when I became an editor in New York, years later. I made decisions quickly. Even if it's wrong, I figured, a quick decision is better than the slow agony of indecision.

The system worked pretty well: I won awards for being the best editor in the field. But that's another story.

Then came 1967, the annus mirabilus when the Sox won the pennant after a nerve-racking four-way race that went down to the very last day of the regular season. Williams was gone; left field was patrolled now by a young guy named Carl Yazstremski. Yaz.

Tony Conigliaro was the right fielder, until he stopped a fast ball with his cheek bone and was out for the rest of the season. On opening day of 1967, though, Conigliaro let a ground ball go through his legs, turning a single into a triple.

A fan in the right field seats hollered in impeccable Bostonese,"Conigliaro, ya bum ya! Yer gonna break Buddin's record for errahs!" Then there was the Dairy Queen experience.

One summer afternoon the Sox were getting shellacked by the California Angels, 8-0. I couldn't stand watching the debacle on TV, so I took my two young children to Dairy Queen for some ice cream.

By the time we got to the local DQ, the score was 8-4. Then 8-6. The Dairy Queen parking lot was full of cars, all of them running down their batteries by listening to the ball game on their radios. The score went to 8-7. The kids got their ice cream, but not a car budged off the parking lot.

Jerry Adair, a light-hitting utility infielder, popped one over the Green Monster in left field for a game-winning home run. The parking lot erupted in wild elation. The whole city went bonkers, it seemed.

Horns blared as if it were VE Day or New Year's Eve.

The Sox went on to win the 1967 American League pennant. Then they lost the World Series to the St. Louis Cardinals in seven games, just as they had the last time they had won the pennant, in 1946.

It was "the curse of the Bambino." The Red Sox hadn't won a World Series since they'd sold Babe Ruth to the despised New York Yankees in 1920.

I moved away from Massachusetts, but I still suffered for the Sox when Bucky Dent hit that homer that gave the hated Yankees the pennant and left Boston fans stunned and frustrated. "The curse of the Bambino" again.

Up or down, champs or chumps, I followed the fortunes of the Red Sox, although at something of a distance. One year my travels took me to Tahiti, where a fellow science fiction writer (and Red Sox fan) lived.

While others were frolicking on the beaches, the two of us huddled in his living room, listening to the Sox over Armed Services Radio.

Two years ago, all the years of frustration came to an end. The Sox got into the American League championship series against — who else? — the despised Yankees. Down three games to none, the Sox proceeded to win four straight, then won the World Series against the Cardinals in four straight. Hallelujah! "The curse of the Bambino" was broken at last, after 84 years.

Last season the Sox didn't do so well, but so far this year they're leading the league. Time will tell. Meanwhile, Sox fans will be biting their nails — as usual.

Naples resident Ben Bova is the author of more than 110 books, including "Titan," his latest novel. Dr. Bova's Web site address is www.benbova.com.