Football in Texas

I love football. I love softball and baseball, but honestly…there is just something about football.

Maybe I love football because my childhood babysitter was a cheerleader. I practiced with her maroon and gold pompoms on Saturday nights when our parents were eating prime rib at the country club. I never minded at all that they dressed up and went out, because she was my friend and my favorite cheerleader.  She was my cheerleader and still is in a way. 

I dreamed of being an Eagle cheerleader on the sidelines doing “Two Bits, Four Bits” and I tried with all of my might to master a toe touch. That never happened, but I could do a herkie for try-outs in 7^th grade.  I wore a gold polo shirt with royal blue wind shorts.  The polo on my shirt matched my shorts perfectly.

Maybe I love football because I'm a Texas girl. Somethings just go together with Texas like chicken fried steak goes with gravy.  Here in the Lone Star State you can bet on:  big hair, Dallas Cowboys, Gary P. Nunn, Cadillac convertibles with longhorns, and cowboy boots.  Football also runs through our veins just like the Brazos River runs through Waco.

When I was diagnosed with cancer many years ago, my golden group of friends first had to see me in person to know I was ok.  We met for lunch in a seafoam green dining room on Watson Street.  After they knew my prognosis was positive, they quickly inquired about what would happen to my hair. We Texas girls love our hair!  We also adored the familiar chandelier we sat under as we ate our sandwiches.  The gigantic subs were perfect!  For a moment, we were perfect too.  Friendship is perfect.

Thank the LORD, I beat cancer and my hair grew back after six months of chemotherapy and fifteen days of radiation. Frequent trips to the beauty salon still keep me blonde. With a hot curling iron, hot rollers, and some good hairspray, my hair can still be big.  Texas is big!  Football is big!

Maybe I love football because my high school years were built around football.  I can still feel the air in Jacksonville and Huntsville back in the day.  Fridays were everything. It began with the pep rallies in the afternoons and ended in the early hours of the next morning.  Those were the days! 

Perhaps I love football because it unites our community.  Some march, some cheer, some twirl.  Willing concession stand workers report to duty early to get the nacho cheese just right.  Stores stock spirit wear and pay to have their windows painted.  Why Not?

The metal bleachers may be scorching hot in August and September, but we still plop down on them and gladly bake ourselves just like cornbread bakes itself in a hot, iron skillet. Texas is hot!

November slowly rolls around and we give thanks for the cooler weather, changing colors, and our many blessings from above.  Giving thanks is the key to life!

When the cold finally blows in, we tote in blankets and thermoses to the freezing and sometimes even icy metal bleachers.  We rob instant hand warmers from our deer stands to keep us warm.  My girls and I love to wear Uggs on our feet and toboggans on our heads.

I love football because my husband does and my boys do too.  My hubby is obviously done with his playing days, but still calls plays from the stands and knows way more than I ever will. 

My boys drink milk, work outside in the summer heat on purpose, and do everything they can to earn their spot under the Thursday or Friday nights.  They just want to be a part of something bigger!      

It's more than just a game and it dawned on me recently that it's more than just the “Friday Night Lights.”

The stadium lights on Friday night are just the beginning. 

It's the sunlight on a humid July morning when the players pull out of the parking lot in their pick-up trucks, but the coaches stay late to line the fields. 

It's the moonlight that's still glowing when young men crawl out of bed for the optional morning workouts.

It’s the sunlight just beginning to peak through in the sky when old men gather in coffee shops to gossip about how they reckon the year is going to pan out.   

It's the night lights and lamps that never seem to take a rest in homes where coaches draw out plays, principals work on schedules, teachers grade papers, and boys scramble to complete their homework just before it is due.

It's the headlights of cars pulling out of towns on Thursday and Friday nights praying for safe travels to and from away games.

It's the classroom lights across the many schools in Texas, which we hope and pray remain open with more state funding cuts, because you got to pass to play!  Education does come first.

It's a rented or borrowed disco light that transform gyms or cafeterias into a dance floors on homecoming night.  I still remember that …

It's the bonfire lights during Homecoming week in towns that have not carelessly blown their chances of having one.  (We blew it.)

It’s the front porch light that Moms keep on until their sons get home safely on Friday and Saturday nights.  We wait and we pray that our precious boys make it home.  (I never got this until I was a Mom.) 

It’s the front porch light that Dads keep on to insure their daughters get walked straight to the door by their dates.  They wait and they load their guns.  (This is Texas, folks.)

I am told…It’s getting your lights knocked out, breath knocked out, but knowing your buddies are staring over you with an outstretched hand ready to pull you up and slap you on the butt before the next play begins.  Get up, get up!  We gotta have you.

It’s the lights in pastel painted and dinosaur themed bedrooms that coaches’ wives turn off when they tuck kids into bed alone and pray for their Daddies to get home safely on the bus.  They know Daddy is a coach and has to do laundry before he can come home. 

It’s the light in a daughter’s eye when she ponders her Dad’s legacy…he did not run a company or make a million, but he coached high school football, and she is proud!  Her Daddy is now in heaven.  She misses him.  Her husband is a coach. Her brother is too.  His legacy continues.  The light in her eyes does still shines too.

It’s the bright lights in the emergency room when a hand needs to be examined after a helmet gets the best of it.  We pray for the x ray and for a good, true report. 

It's the light and sparkle in a young man’s eyes when his mom and dad are nowhere to be found after the loss, but he looks up to his coach and says “Yes Sir, I gave it my all.”

I don't know much about positions or plays on the football field, but I know that being a part of a team is one of the most valuable experiences we can have in life. 

I know that in football, because I just confirmed with my boys, that there are 12 players on the field at a time and that each one must do their part and give 100% or the team fails. 

Football is not an individual sport.  Likewise, life is not an individual sport. 

Here’s to another year of “Friday Night Lights” in this great state.

May the light shine on us all!