Baptized in a sea of maize: the redemption of football Saturdays

There were things I liked about Vanderbilt. Other things that I loved. Football Saturdays do not fall into either of these categories.

At Vanderbilt, I loathed football Saturdays. Home games meant music blaring from frat row all day, sidewalks covered in Natty Light and red Solo cups, and standing for a gazillion hours, all to watch a sport I could hardly feign enthusiasm for. I can count on one hand the number of games I went to. I’ve lost track of the number of Saturdays I spent playing with my yeasties in the lab. Stop. Geek is chic right now.

When I got an email from the Michigan athletic department offering me the privilege of purchasing season tickets to attend football games in the Big House for the low, low price of $300 more than I ever wanted to spend on football, I laughed in derision and sent it to the trash. I know what college football games are like. You’re not fooling me. Paying to spend all day on my feet and come home smelling like the floor of a bar without a pocket full of tips to show for it? I wasn’t born yesterday.

But then my mom sits my sister and I down and advises us to buy into this scheme. “It’ll be different”, she says. “These are great teams,” she says. “There won’t be another season this great while you’re a student,” she says. “It’s a culture thing, you’ve gotta try it,” she says. She got me on that last one. Curse my curious nature and insatiable appetite for new things.

So $300 and a few weeks later, I’ve got a packet of football tickets in my hand. I started the season off strong: sold the first one to a kid (who may or may not have been high) in front of Zingerman’s Deli. But the next game was the Notre Dame game. And Amy and I decided to do our first big Michigan football game together. There were two rules.

1. No one else can come.
2. We do what we want.

It turns out we wanted to buy matching t-shirts. And eat sushi and ice cream. And arrive an hour after seating started. And sit in the ninth row behind the north end zone. And wear flashing light-up bracelets on each wrist. And accept free water bottles from a well-meaning but sorely mistaken stadium employee. And wave our pompoms and sing the fight song a million times and yell our team to victory.

I concede. Football Saturdays aren’t all bad.

Go blue.

Happy Tuesday.