Go Pats

Wanted to say thanks, again, to all of you. Mostly because I know you're here: my brain is starting to be able step outside the ridiculous dramas that are happening in my family, and see them and go "What the hell is happening here?" and I know that a large part of that is thanks to the blogging part of my brain. The part that thinks "wow, where's Janice when you need her?" or "Maya's Granny would know the perfect thing to say right now." Please know that with all of the absurdity & disconnection from reality and drama that is happening here, everysingleday, that so many of you are in my mind and heart, helping me to get through it.

And to get through all the regular stuff, the stuff that shouldn't be this hard, like four o'clocks and football games.

Tonight's game is niggling in my mind like no other football game before it, only because of Nana: She and I had a running faux-argument about the merits of football. She insisted that there were merits, and I insisted that if a grown man wants a piece of leather that he can throw around, all he needed to do was go to the store and buy one - there was certainly no need for all this traipsing and chasing up and down of fields, and certainly no need for tackling and being injured for the rest of your life for a stupid BALL. Nana suffered my lack of interest in organized sports (and my Kindergarten teacher-let's all just get along- mentality) semi-stoicly... which means that she and I had essentially the same discussion every time a football game was on, particularly a Patriots game.

Nana was - with the exception of the Red Sox (or "Red Slobs" as she called them), a diehard, home-team sports fan. The heydays of the Celtics and Larry Bird were crystal clear in her memories, and she even had a positive thing or two to say about the Bruins, even though she found hockey mostly boring. But the Patriots were her team - I'd like to remember some of the stuff she told me about them here, but I honestly wasn't paying that much attention: football players that were good, football players and coaches that sucked, traitors and the traded, glories and goners... she knew a lot of useless Patriots information, and watched every game as if the team depended on her in order to win.

Which, of course, they did. She would run up and down the entire field with them yelling and stomping, cheering and jeering. Coaches were called horrible names, players had their honor defiled. Even when they won, she'd be sure to tell me how they almost screwed it up.

And this is - in case you aren't interested in football &/or don't live in New England - a record setting year for the Patriots. They've gone undefeated for the entire season, heading into the Super Bowl. No one's ever done that before, apparently. Which is great for them, and would, ordinarily, mean very little to me...

Except this is a game my Nana won't be here to nag me into watching.

In Super Bowls past, we've watched together, me reading during the football and listening to her scream, her tsking me when I would look up in order to catch the new commercials, then head out for a cigarette. I know there was another football game they were in, the day after she died, but I wasn't ... aware ... enough of anything for that one to matter to me. This one, I feel it.

I feel all the hype and crazinesss, and I just wish it were over. I miss the "What am I going to do with you, you have no sense of team spirit?!?" conversation that we'd have already had 3 times today.

And I know that it's just another football game, that it has no impact in my life besides this: It's just one more thing we won't be doing together.

I don't know whether or not I'll watch try to watch it alone (Sister Ch probably won't be watching, and Mum and Dad will no doubt be smoking in the cellar), or take advantage of my first Tivo-fied Super Bowl and wait till later and just watch the commercials, or just... blow off the whole thing altogether. But I know that Nana will be riding the coach... (I seriously looked up the coach's name to add it to this post, but that felt forced... Nana will know it either way) from the sidelines, giving him her very clear opinions of each and every play. And even heaven won't be able to help them if they lose.