Adding to the list of How it’s Starting to Feel More Like Fall is football. Also making the list is, “it was still so dark this morning when I got up for work that I had to turn a light on,” but that’s not today’s topic. Football’s probably not my favorite sport, but it’s up there, and there are certain aspects of the different levels that I enjoy.
I like high school, and the feel of walking through the parking lot on a crisp September Friday night, heading toward the lights and the marching bands. There’s just something fun about watching a bunch of kids playing hard and having fun, even knowing the majority of them will never play again once they graduate, and there’s nothing quite like a high school halftime show.
Or college, and taking a break from raking leaves (bad thought, get it out!) on Saturday mornings to come in for the noon kickoff (the hypocrisy of the NCAA is starting to rub me a little, but I’ll still watch – college is, in some cases, better than the pros). If you’re on a smaller campus, grabbing a quick lunch before heading over to the game (though we usually only stayed for the first half – at Mount Union, the game was pretty much over by halftime).
I like the NFL too – lazing through a Sunday morning, then making a pot of chili and sitting to watch the game with the family (C needs to get a little older so I have a football-watching partner; S isn’t really into it). Of course, this is Cleveland, so there’s not really that much to get excited about with the Browns, even though they’ve looked halfway decent in the preseason (they do that every year, and get everyone’s hopes up, then disappoint – or really, just perform the way we should have expected. We’re kind of always in the “wait ’til next year” mode [with all our teams], but with some people, I think it’s gotten to the “wait ’til… oh, forget it, it’s never going to happen in my lifetime” point). Back when I was a kid and the Browns were good (the 80s was the last time that happened), we’d have dog bone cookies on game day. I hope I can bring that back for our kids someday, but I’m waiting until there’s a reasonably good chance that we’ll still want to watch the game after the first quarter. No sense in making dog bone cookies if the game’s over after 15 minutes. Still, I doubt we’d have any problems finishing them…
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