HAMMOND | Mary Bellile walked beside the couch in her White Sox-themed living room and pointed to photographs of herself posing with professional baseball players.
"There's my boys," Bellile said of the athletes in the framed pictures.
Every season since 1991, Bellile, along with her son Dell and daughter-in-law Susan, has traveled to a different city to watch her beloved White Sox play on the road. During the journeys, which her family has labeled "The Mary Bellile-White Sox Tour," Bellile has met Jim Thome, Paul Konerko, Jermaine Dye, Bartolo Colon, Frank Thomas, Carlos Lee and Magglio Ordonez.
MORE: View additional photos of White Sox fan Mary Bellile.
She has a story and visual evidence for every encounter.
For Bellile, the excitement of opening day is as precious as any item in her collection of White Sox memorabilia that includes a lamp, plaques, flags, posters, blankets, baseballs, dolls, autographs and bricks from Chicago stadiums of the past and present. The 90-year-old Hammond resident's die-hard allegiance to the South Siders has kept her young.
"She's seen them so many times over the years and met the players and accosted the players and everything else," Dell said with a laugh. "She's always been a big (White Sox) fan."
But Bellile and the rest of the White Sox faithful had to wait an extra day for their baseball appetites to be satisfied. Monday's cold, wintry weather forced the debut of the 2009 White Sox to be pushed back to 1:05 p.m. today at U.S. Cellular Field.
Bellile will be watching her "fellas" play the Kansas City Royals on TV in the same house where she raised six children, all Clark graduates, by herself after her husband died in 1964. She's anxious about the start of a new season, but she has been following baseball long enough to know the first game doesn't make or break a team.
"I would give them a month," she said. "They either click or they don't. Some of the rookies click or some of the fellas with a year behind them click. But you never know. They could win 16 in a row and then go down the tubes."
Nevertheless, Bellile is eager to see the White Sox back in action for the first time since they were eliminated by the Tampa Bay Rays in last year's American League Division Series. She wants to see her favorite player, Thome, point the barrel of his bat toward the outfield as he steps into his trademark hitting stance.
Bellile met Thome when she visited Pittsburgh's PNC Park in 2007. Dell spotted Thome while his mother was in a bathroom, but the White Sox slugger didn't hurry away without meeting his biggest fan. Instead, he waited for her.
"Would you ever think that a ballplayer making all that money would wait for an old lady to come out of the restroom so she could say, 'Hi?' " Bellile said.
The memories are plentiful, but the tour isn't over. Bellile is planning to hit the road again in June, this time for Miller Park in Milwaukee.
"I wouldn't trade places with anybody in this world," Bellile said. "I don't care what they have."
