Fall Means Football

Fall is football season, and since I was a little girl and heard Daddy listening to Kern Tipps broadcasting the old Southwest Conference games, it has been in my head. I even had a p.e. teacher who thought all middle school girls should know about football rules and formations, so I'm not a novice to the game and can stand toe to toe with anybody on what a penalty means or whether the opposing team should be in  a prevent defense. When Tech was playing Texas(and winning) last Saturday, it was bittersweet because I expected the phone to ring in the middle of the excitement and it would be Tricia(my sister) saying, "I'm watching from Heaven. Did you see that last play?" There was never a Tech game on tv that she didn't call whether I was still in Lubbock or had moved here to Cibolo. So I was watching, cheering all to my self(which is kind of goofy since you are there all alone), and waiting for the phone to ring.

Football has always been in my teaching life, too. When I was teaching at Tech, I always had football players in my classes because the coaches knew I would be fair, and alas, some teachers weren't to athletes. Kenny, my big sweet lineman from New Deal, who got knocked out in off-season boxing, came to class on Monday, and didn't know what was going on around him or how to get to class without help and turned in a blank sheet of paper for a little pop test we had. His fellow Tech players in class told me he had not acted right since the boxing experiment. I phoned his mother(had never met her but knew she needed to know), and she took him to the doctor--concussion sure enough. So they treated him immediately and kept him out of any contact practice. I'm not sure it didn't have lasting effects on him because I suspect he had had other concussions as he played the game. Made me think right away this week of Tua in Miami who should NEVER have been put back in the first game when he was wobbling and should NEVER have started the next game on Thursday. 

I had one Tech football player who didn't turn in a big research paper when he should have, asked for time because of  illness or something or other, and I did give him 3 more days. Never turned in the big paper. So gave him the F he deserved. The coach called, not to berate but just for an explanation, and when I told him the sequence of events, he was very polite and said the boy deserved it since he didn't follow through.  I would like to say the kid came and apologized--which he didn't. Instead he  got drafted by the New York Giants and made more money on his bonus than I made in a lifetime.

And then I think of my first year at Wilson when they had the best football team I had ever seen, went unbeaten.  Honestly, they were amazing in strength and speed. I'm not sure anyone even scored on them. They got to the first playoff game which was in Snyder I think or down that direction..And it began to snow--not gentle little flakes but a snowstorm that blurred the field and stands. They should have called off the game because players couldn't see lines or referees or coaches. Nobody scored, but eventually they gave the game to the other team because of times they had crossed the 50--which they couldn't see. That time Wilson might have gone to state because they were that good, but Nature beat them.

And then much later Wilson went to 6 man football, and they were good at that, too. I went to see a playoff game, and when I saw slow-moving, slow-talking Armando on the field, I punched everyone around me and screamed, "Look at him! He is faster than anyone in six counties!" I couldn't believe it because he moved in the hallways at a snail's pace. On the football field he was in his own zone. You just can't tell.

So is today the only time sports were popular? Wrong. The Native Americans who were in the Hill Country by the 1700s loved to compete, too. And it was the girls who had a great time with a game kind of like lacrosse. They would get a buffalo skin, wrap it in the shape of a ball, get long sticks made from straight live oak branches(hard to find), and whack away on a field laid out for them. The Comanche girls were particularly known for their abilities, but all other Native American girls learned to play the game, too. The men would make bets and cheer on their ladies in tournaments. The Tonkawa who were here on Cibolo Creek were not as good as the Comanches, but they still could hold their own in most games.

So athletic competition has always been with us and will probably always be. Maybe one day when we are on the moon, someone will take a football and see how far it can be thrown. The Lunar Bowl--get your tickets now.