As I wait for the delivery of additional photographs, I'm going to take a momentary leave from my travel writings and provide some thoughts inspired by this past weekend's glorious football playoff games.
I want to talk about sports fans. Specifically, female sports fans. Which, of course, are about as real as truck-driving hammerhead sharks. Females can play sports, and they can watch sports, but, due to biological restrictions, females are evolutionarily incapable of becoming real sports fans. Fortunately, most women openly disdain sports, sparing us from this discussion at all. At times, however, you encounter the self-proclaimed "female fan", the one who wears team jerseys and yells a lot in a bar, but does so in a very self-aware, "look-at-me-I'm-a-cute-female-fan" way.
Exhibit A:
This infamous encounter took place last year in the Western Conference semifinals between the Phoenix Suns and San Antonio Spurs. It was a tight game, in a tight series, and there were only seconds left to play. In short, it was the very essence of sports. It is why men watch. Competition. Survival of the Fittest. Notice, however, the lone female in this picture.
SHE ISN'T EVEN WATCHING THE FUCKING GAME!
She's staring off into the distance, perhaps admiring a fellow female's Gucci purse, or wondering if she could make it to the bathroom before the game is over, or analyzing a haircut of the coach's wife, or looking at someone's baby and thinking how cute it is and how she wants one too, or hating the big toe of the man she is with, or thinking how she's much rather be at Coldstone right now than here. Every other fan is riveted by the action. Men would strongly consider sleeping with their grandma to get a seat that good to this game (alive or dead). Her? Not even remotely interested.
In New York, their cluelessness is beyond reproach. This past Sunday, watching the Giants playoff game at a hardcore blue-collar bar in Brooklyn, a bar in which, had a Cowboys fan walked in, there was a good chance he would've been denied entry (at best) or lit on fire (at worst), the female table waitress was wearing a New England Patriots Jersey. Never mind that you are in Brooklyn, never mind that it is the playoffs, never mind that you aren't a Giants fan ... But a Patriots Jersey? She had no clue. It was offensive. New York hates everything Boston. We hate words that even rhyme with Boston, like, say, Lost In .. Space. Why was she wearing it? In some pathetic attempt to say, hey guys! I'm from Boston! Look me! I'm a sports fan! I'm standing up for my team! In all reality, she was most likely wearing it because she thought blue and red looked good on her, and her brother got it for her for Christmas. That's why they make "cute" jerseys for the girl sports fans. Because looking cute is the only reason they're interested in sports in the first place. Either that, or because their boyfriend is into sports and they want to seem supportive, the same way I have to pretend to care when Jill excitedly tells me that Jamie Lynn Spears is pregnant.
I've heard it before. Girls telling me "I'm a HUGE Broncos fan!" or "Go Steelers!" ... Maybe their dad was a fan, and they like their dad, so they want to respect him. Maybe they do it to get guys. I'll go so far as to say some girls might actually like the competition or basics of the sport. But the overwhelming emotion felt watching man challenging man, in a battle of strength, a battle that stimulates every cell in your body, a battle as seeminly important as when cavemen faced off against rival caveman, a battle of domination, of success, of pride, of superiority, of survival, of life, this feeling they will never grasp. Nor would I want them too. I don't want my girlfriend depressed for seven weeks after a Chargers loss. There's only room for one of those people. And I don't want to be depressed for seven weeks when reading how Katherine Heigl was disappointed with her wedding cake. There's only room for one of those, too. So please, fold up your jerseys, put away your face paint, stop throwing terms around like "special teams" and "dominating the line of scrimmage". Feel free to watch, quietly, as the men on screen do battle. But, for the love of everything, please don't pretend to understand or, even worse, pretend to care. The only person you're fooling is yourself.