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Macaroni Dad

'Cause Dads Love Macaroni, Too!

September 12, 2014
History of Football

Between August and January (February if you’re lucky) the earth pivots slightly on its axis and prepares for one of the greatest cyclical events known in modern times. I don’t watch a great deal of bowling, golf or ping pong, basketball can be fun, soccer can be a rush whenever you watch or play and of course Olympic curling with all of its brushing and ice sliding still intrigues me to this day - but my favorite sport since I was a young boy has always been Football. When your favorite college or NFL Football team starts to practice in the peak of the summer heat, it makes normal people crazy and it makes the crazy people paint themselves in team colors and join in strange ritualistic behaviors. Football changes people inside. When Football happens it happens to all of us, it brings more people together in America than any other sport ever has.

But how did it happen you are wondering? Don’t worry, I know...

Without doing any official research and only nonsensical pontificating (lukewarm beer in hand), left temporal headache, lack of sleep, a slight fever, blurred vision, and only reputation and harsh ridicule at risk, I will decree that Soccer was the sport that came first. A guy named Yanni, invited a bunch of sweaty cave dudes to kick a ball (okay it was a head I think) around a grassy field until it went into a net, followed quickly by going berserk and running around some more until the fans went nuts and poured onto the streets. “Yes,” Yanni thought as he kicked yet another long shot into the net, “this sport will be amazing and someday we will bring teams together from around the globe and play in a big tournament. The winner of all the teams from around the world can have a big cup...We will call it the Big Cup.” Later that day the rest of the cave guys told Yanni it would sound better if it was called the World Cup.

One day Bill came to soccer practice with a flat ball and it was hard to kick so the guys tackled him and gave him Tom-turkeys and raspberries until he hollered. When the dog pile had been dismantled no one wanted to go home because the wives thought they were out hunting. Bill figured it would be too difficult to kick a flat ball around the field so he started to throw it around and tackle his teammates. “Hey, I’ve got an idea," he said. "Let’s get in a huddle and bonk each other on the heads and throw this thing around and collide at a full sprint until you can hear your femur snap. We will call this ridiculousness Rugby and this will not be for wimps or sissies."

Dave was a bit of a book worm and had not been the one to think of Rugby. He was most displeased at the manner in which he kept getting smashed in the head by all his large, thick-headed, Neolithic brain stem buddies and after forgetting his name, locker combination and most of why he ever played the game in the first place decided to find something else to do for fun. One day when one of his team mates brought his teeth and index finger back to him he decided that his Rugby days were over. He set off to make his own sport. First he decided to make the ball smaller, put a net on a stick and then get thick, protective gloves and chest guards and knee pads. “Up yours,” he said, “I am wearing padded gloves and a helmet that protect my noggin.” That’s a fantastic idea, thought Dave, now I won’t forget my name all the time. His Rugby buddies made fun of Dave’s uniform and his little stick net so they called his sport Lacrosse. If you will research this phenomenon today, Lacrosse literally translated means, sissy boy with stick and small ball.

Scott and Marty were two American college guys drinking beer and sitting on their couch who had just gotten kicked off the Lacrosse team. Apparently the coach said they couldn’t play because they had skipped their 7:25 am Intro to Economics class for the entire semester and they were in danger of failing out of school. Although their GPA’s were suffering horribly, they were determined not to let their excusal from the National Championship College Lacrosse team fetter their spirits. 

"We don’t need those guys," said Scott, "let’s make our own sport." 

"Right on," said Marty. 

We don’t need sticks, they thought, but we do need pads and helmets. The flat ball thing from Rugby was kind of cool because you could pick it up and throw it around. By the way, it should be brown and shaped like a missile so it can fly tremendous distances. We should be able to use our hands, they thought, because kicking a ball up and down the field without any hands sounds way too much like soccer. We will make the field really, really big – like a hundred yards long or something crazy. You can kick and throw and catch and run and punt and do almost anything in this sport. We will dress big guys in shoulder pads and a helmet with a grill on the front. As long as you can get this ball to that end of the field without someone catching you it will be a score - but not just 1 point – it will be 6 or something huge. Oh! And then we will put big yellow fork things at the end of the field and if you can kick the ball over it you can score more points!

They jumped up and down and used crayons to draw on their walls while they high fived and let their genius percolate freely. Finally they decided that the players would get sad and tired a lot so they should have cheerleaders that look like Megan Fox and Jessica Alba. They can hold pom-poms and do cartwheels, handstands and splits in mesmerizing fashion. It will be the greatest gathering of robustly high-strung, ridiculously, ape-like crazy, face painting, cape wearing, field charging beer drinking, TV screaming, armchair quarterback warrior types the world has ever seen.

They reached into their dorm room refrigerator and pulled out their last pair of Pabst Blue Ribbons, popped the tops and tapped their cans together. We will call this Dudeball they screamed! The next day they changed the name to Football because ‘Dudeball’ was already taken...the rest is history.

Football season is upon us, partake and enjoy. May your team do something great this year.

***

A few weeks ago my sister in Gainesville had an extra ticket for the Florida Gator season opener and I was told the available seat was right next to my oldest daughter (now 20), a student and a Gator in Gainesville. The symbolism of that special evening runs even deeper because the stadium is only a few hundred yards from where she was brewed and took her first breath when I was a student there almost 20 years ago. Somehow along the way the little pumpkin that I used to cradle much like a football in one arm grew into a young lady and continues to make her Mac Dad and family proud. The much anticipated football game we sat down to watch never did make it past 10 seconds of play. The game that we gathered around that evening was finally cancelled after 4 hours of uninterrupted lighting and rain. Although we didn’t get to see a lot of football being played that evening, sitting next to my girl, which doesn’t happen enough anymore, and watching the sheets of rain cascade down was a special moment in my life and a time with her that I will always hold special and remember. We could have left the stadium earlier that night, but part of me didn’t want the night to end.


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