My manager and the V.P. of our division are big Michigan football fans. This has created a schism in our department, as most others here are die-hard Ohio State fans, and everyone (on both sides) has decided that this is a way to get the V.P.’s attention one way or another and kiss some serious corporate butt (one pastime in which I refuse to participate). On one side of the room we have a gentleman with season tickets to Ohio State football who bleeds not only crimson, but grey. On the other side, we have my manager, who has a framed photo of the Michigan stadium in his office accompanied by a stuffed doll of Ohio State’s coach (complete with crimson tie) dangling from a noose. (What’s the coach’s name, anyway? Nevermind, I don’t care.)
Often (too often), I’m asked on which side of the fence I reside.
I absolutely hate football.
Well, let me qualify that. If it’s
huddle in the stands at a high-school football game with a cup of hot cocoa while talking to your friends and watching everything but the game football, that can be fun. Also, on one or two fall Sundays each year I enjoy
turn on the game with the volume low but not look at the T.V. at all because the sound somehow befits an Autumn Sunday football. And though I do it less these days, I’ve also participated in
I turn on the SuperBowl so I can see the commercials, then I mute the rest including the insipid halftime show football.
But in general, I hate football.
So, what can I say to these people who want to know if I’m a Buckeye or a Wolverine?
1. I’d have to try really hard to care less about your football team.
2. Oh, that silly little rivalry!
3. You don’t read much, do you?
Or how about . . .
4. Do you think your precious little team would let you play on it? Why not? If you’re half as good at playing football as you are at rambling on about it, you’d be an asset. Maybe you should get up off your couch and actually toss a ball around once in a while.
5. How can I support organized college or professional sports when public libraries and schools all over this country are failing? You think one of these geniuses on the football team is smart enough to be President someday?
6. How can you watch that stuff? I bet you watch the draft, too. I can’t imagine anything more boring . . . and irritating – since I bet that for each professional recruit drafted you could find a public school teacher . . . or two . . . who will be laid off this season.
Or maybe . . .
7. What’s a Buckeye?
Having said all that, I must admit, every time Ohio State loses (no matter to whom), I have to smile just a little, because I know that . . . somewhere . . . a certain someone is literally writhing in agony.
