There are very few days in our lives that will be forever etched in our memories. From the moment the day begins to the moment it ends, we are filled with an inexplicable feeling of jubilation and we know that for the rest of our lives, this will be a day long remembered. I had a day like this last Friday, and I owe it all to the New York Yankees.

One of the advantages of working for the Mayor’s Office is that when there is a major event in the City, they usually need volunteers to work the event. Well, Friday was a major event; it was New York Yankees Day in New York City in honor of their World Series win, which consisted of a parade down the Canyon Of Heroes and a ceremony on the steps of City Hall.

Being a loyal City employee who always is willing to do my part to help the City in any way, I volunteered to work the parade as soon as the Yankees won Game 1.

The day after the Yankees swept the World Series – for the second year in a row by the way – I went to City Hall for a volunteer briefing. I received my parade credential and was told to report back to City Hall at 8:00am the next morning.

Here I am, on a Friday, not at my desk, but at City Hall with a Yankees hat, jersey and jacket on ready to work one of the most famous parades in the history of New York City – and I was getting paid for it – only in New York.

My job was to escort the Yankee families to their seats when the parade was over – that was at 2:00pm – it was now 8:30am. So I had almost six hours to enjoy myself. I decided that I would walk the parade route and observe the crowd. My friend and co-worker Carlos brought cigars – because this was definitely a cigar-worthy day – and we spent the next two hours smoking cigars up and down Broadway while thousands of Yankee fans lined the streets and awaited the arrival of the greatest team in baseball.

The day just got better from there. I got a chance to take a picture with Mayor Rudy Giuliani, WABC Radio’s Curtis Sliwa, and Yankee Relief Pitcher Allen Watson Jr. I also had the pleasure of meeting two of the greatest baseball players in the history of the sport, the one and only Yogi Berra and Mr. October himself, Reggie Jackson – did I mention that I got paid for this?

When the parade started, the feeling of actually being there was indescribable. The now hundreds of thousands of people that lined Broadway were pumped and ready to see their Yankees after their record 25th World Series victory. The crowd lined the streets, the rooftops and even the tops of trucks just to get a glimpse of the World Champions. I was at the tail end of the parade, but I could tell when they were getting closer because the cheers billowed down Broadway like a tidal wave as they approached – and when the Yankees finally arrived, the cheers for these heroes of baseball was deafening.

There they were; Jeter, Leyritz, O’Neill, Brosius, Strawberry, Rivera, Clemens, Cone, Curtis, and the rest of the 1999 World Champion New York Yankees. A team that, despite their personal hardships, managed to win the World Series for an unprecedented 25th time – for the record, the team that holds the record for the second most World Series wins has only won nine – almost three times less than the Yankees. Combine that with the amazing record this team has had both on and off the field and you can see why they are, without a doubt, the Team Of The Century.

And there I was – right smack dab in the middle of it – working the parade of parades, doing my part as a City worker – and a Yankee fan, to help make this day the greatest it could be for the world, and for myself.

If I could borrow a line from Willow, “My children will come to remember this day.”