After postponing my Sunday brunch date with friends, my pal Todd wrote in response, "I’ll never understand your obsession with this football thing but that’s OK. The brunch will be there next weekend."
Sure, I canceled brunch over football, but rest assured, my friends don't think I'm a jerk. The trade-off isn't a big deal, and Todd is not the only person who doesn't get my enthusiasm for the game. I am a female after all, and definitely more on the princess end of the spectrum. I look like the kind of chick whose ideal Sunday might be spent shopping at the mall, or at the spa getting my hair and nails done, not planted in front of a TV cheering and shouting profanities at professional athletes. It is in fact true, however - I'm a football girl.
Growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 80's was a haven for football aficionados, even more so for Forty-Niner fans. The 49ers were the team of the 80's and had four SuperBowl championships throughout that decade to uphold the deserved title. As a result, football was religion in my childhood home, and the Niners were practically deities. I learned football fundamentals at Kindergarten age, had the opportunity to meet some of the players in person, and watched every victory parade that came through Downtown San Francisco.To this day, despite the fact that the current team is not a reflection of the team it was in the 80's, I am a 49er loyalist, part of what Niners fans mutually call themselves "The Faithful." Football itself incites an excitement and familiarity in me that can only be explained by my own experiences in team sports and, of course, my football-filled upbringing. There is a sense of collective exhiliration and devotion that I love about the game, and I can't imagine losing that feeling for as long as it continues to be around.
