For years, Tom Guy bled blue and white. For seven seasons, he played clarinet in the Baltimore Colts' Band. But on Saturday, as Guy wheels his purple Dodge van into the parking lot at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, where the Ravens and Colts will meet in an NFL playoff game, the Ravens fan will be marching to a different drummer.
"It's time the Colts got a good, old-fashioned spanking," said Guy, 48, of Hampden. "If [the Ravens] win, holy mackerel, they might have to shut the city down and close schools. It'd be like a blizzard."
Karen McLaughlin-Kruemmel is over "It." Finally. Twenty-six years after the Colts left Baltimore, the Glen Burnie woman has shrugged the last bit of the chip off her shoulder and embraced the Ravens in her heart.
On Saturday night, McLaughlin-Kruemmel, 52, will sit in her living room, bedecked in Ravens garb, her hair streaked with purple, a Ravens bird hat on her head, a Ravens bandanna on her dog, and root the hometown team on. To heck with horseshoes.
"I was sad the Colts left, but I love the Ravens so much," she said. "Life goes on."
With the exception of the Ravens' rivalry with the Pittsburgh Steelers, no subject in Baltimore sports stirs the blood like Ravens vs. Colts. All week, their game has been debated endlessly on talk radio, in taverns and on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook.
To wit:
What's the spell the Colts have over the Ravens, having won their past seven meetings? Will Indy kicker Matt Stover return to haunt his old team? And do Baltimore fans still wrestle with the Colts having skipped town 26 years ago?
"You can't ignore 1984. It's the dead elephant in the living room," said Jim McGee, retired chief of psychology at Sheppard Pratt Hospital. "Quite a few people recall how the team left in that clandestine operation, though many of us are in nursing homes now.
"There will be a lot of irony, and emotion, attached to this game."
Then there's Stover, the celebrated kicker who, after 13 years, was unceremoniously dumped by the Ravens, only to latch on with the then-undefeated Colts and boot the game-winning field goal in a 17-15 victory in Baltimore in November.
"That was a hurtful, though self-inflicted, wound," said Michael Gibbons, executive director of the Sports Legends Museum at Camden Yards. "We let a good guy go, and now he's with the bad guys."
Then there's the trail of losses to Indianapolis, nine years of wreckage at the hands of quarterback Peyton Manning, the league's four-time Most Valuable Player whose play reminds many of that of John Unitas, the Baltimore Colts' great signal-caller.
These are the issues facing Ravens fans all week.
"Think of it," Gibbons said. "If we beat Indianapolis, it might be the greatest victory in Ravens history short of their [January 2001] Super Bowl win."
Daydreams abound in offices from Lutherville to Linthicum.
"I'd be surprised if a lot of meaningful work gets done this week," Gibbons said.
Ravens blood is running hot, clear to Annapolis where both the State House dome and the governor's mansion are bathed in purple lights.
"And they'll stay that way, if [the Ravens] keep winning," Gov. Martin O'Malley said.
He knows firsthand the depth of fans' passions. On Sunday, O'Malley attended a fundraiser in Annapolis during the Ravens' playoff victory over the New England Patriots.
"There was a TV in the room, and I wasn't allowed to talk until there was a timeout," he said. "The Ravens were the bigger draw."
That their team overwhelmed the favored Patriots after struggling for much of the season has Ravens fans hyped for Indianapolis, said McGee, the psychologist.
"Is this game still David vs. Goliath? Absolutely," he said. "But if the Ravens are underdogs, they are underdogs with promise - and it's those scenarios that get people the most enthusiastic. At least there is hope."
Guy, a Ravens season-ticket holder, agreed. Otherwise, he and his family wouldn't be making their second road trip in two weeks.
"It's [Baltimore's] time," he said. "Sitting in the stands at New England was surreal. Nobody believed what was happening. After a few minutes, the Patriots fans went numb. They actually forgot how to insult us."
Afterward, when the Guys returned to their purple van, they found that it had been spat upon and Ravens decals torn off.
"Two mounted policemen were standing guard over it when we got there," he said.
Others in the crowd approached the Guys with an unusual request.
"They pleaded with us to beat the Colts next," he said. "They kept saying, 'We hate them, too.' "
Guy will be in the stands Saturday night, egging on the Ravens to do just that.
"I'm taking my kazoo, too," he said. "I'm going to sit in the stands and play the Baltimore Colts fight song, which still sends chills down my spine.
"I won't play it in tribute to the Indianapolis Colts. I'll play it to honor Baltimore."