A few years ago, I was playing a trivia game with my colleagues as part of a holiday celebration. One of the questions was: “What is the biggest food day in the U.S., after Thanksgiving?”
Christmas, I wondered to myself? Silly girl. Everybody else knew it was Super Bowl Sunday.
Don’t hate me because I’m not a football fan.
Let it be known that I cheer on the Patriots. I just don’t pay much attention to them.
The reasons for my lack of interest are not clear. My father preferred baseball and hockey. We regularly went to Red Sox games when I was a kid, and Dad taught me how to fill out the score card. We played catch, but never threw a football around the yard.
The Bruins were a top-notch team when I was growing up. This was the Bobby Orr era. I was a huge fan.
In high school, I liked to go to basketball games. We had a good team, and I went to tournament games on a raucous fan bus a few times.
I went to football games, too. But it was a social thing. In those days, the games were held on Saturday afternoons. I enjoyed standing around with my friends, sipping hot chocolate, seeing who else was there.
But there was one big problem. I just didn’t understand it. I know people think baseball is slow, but I don’t like it when players have to go back and restart their drive toward the—what? goal post, end zone? The plays confuse me, in the same way that battle scenes in movies do.
Football just doesn’t appeal to me.
I do feel a tad left out on big game days and, of course, Super Bowl Sunday. Once, my husband Paul and I went to Trader Joe’s on a Saturday in January and wondered why the lines were so long. Yes, it was that Saturday.
In our younger years, we’d always go to the movies on SBS. Paul is not a football fan either.
I think I could enjoy the traditional activities associated with football fandom. Tailgate parties, for example, sound like fun. Who doesn’t like to eat? I like to eat outside, too.
One of my cousins, who is a major Pats fan, recently went to Florida to see them play the Dolphins. If someone offered me tickets to Florida to watch football, I’d take them. A few days in the sun would be worth the torture of the game.
Years ago, Paul and I lived in Providence, R.I. We could hear the shouts and cheers coming from the nearby Brown University stadium whenever there was a home football game. It made me think I should buy a Brown scarf and beanie and go cheer on the team. It seemed like a romantic thing do—something out of a 1950s movie.
Then again—nah.
The Thanksgiving Day game was always a big event in my hometown in Massachusetts. We played the town next door, which had fewer students and was in a different division. We probably should have won every year, but didn’t. Some of my cousins lived in the other town, so this friendly rivalry spilled over into family gatherings.
I did care whether our team won and I faithfully attended the games, no matter how cold it was. But I never had any idea how we won or lost.
I much preferred the buildup to the big game. This was called the Case Rally, Case High School being our opposing team. Each class competed for the honor of winning the rally. We each had a hallway to decorate—bulletin boards, streamers hanging from the ceiling, exhortations painted on signs, etc. Then we had to plan and perform a skit in which we triumphed over Case.
These were exciting weeks. I didn’t have to give a single thought to football. I just had to think “rah, rah, rah.” Our class was enthusiastic, but we never won. Our best idea was a “Wizard of Oz” pastiche, but we lost to the seniors, who did a takeoff on “Easy Rider.” I seem to remember a motorcycle being wheeled into the gym. Would that have been possible?
My college was big on basketball and hockey. I think football was relegated to club status. I didn’t choose Providence for that reason, but I was glad I didn’t have to pretend to enjoy football.
The closest I have come in recent years to getting near a football game was when our high school team went to the finals. I work for the school department, and some of my students were asking me if I was going to the game that night. I “I wish I could,” I said, sincerely, “but it’s my husband’s birthday today.”
“Oh, bring him,” they said. I told them he wasn’t a fan. Then the group offered to sing “Happy Birthday” to Paul, which I recorded and sent to him.
Yes, the players melted my heart. Yes, I watched the game on TV. Yes, I shouted at the screen.
Just don’t ask me how we did it. All I know is—we won.
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