Football season is well underway and it happens to coincide with the launch of this blog.  While I am hesitant to dedicate the first sports post to football—the so-called “America’s Game”—it provides a perfect opportunity to start this section off on the right foot.  Or the left foot, whichever you prefer.  The reason being that the phrase “America’s Game,” something I used to cringe at, is now a perfect metaphor in which both football and the United States of America share an alarming—and hilarious—number of parallels (at least until the neo-Confederate dream of NASCAR overtaking the dominance of football comes to pass).

Let me begin with a confession: I like to watch football*.  OK, I love to watch football.  Whether it is college or the NFL, you can usually find my anything-with-a-ball-obsessed ass planted firmly in front of the soft glow of a football broadcast emanating from a needlessly expensive, flat-screen television each and every Saturday and Sunday.  And when the opportunity presents itself, I am no stranger to witnessing a football game from the oft-frigid seats of an actual stadium.

* apologies to my international friends who may mistake this term for what we Americans dismissingly call “soccer”

Like any football fan, I can mindlessly go down the list and check off everything I like about not only the game itself, but about the general atmosphere and experience of “America’s Game.”  Many positives of the football experience transcend the excitement of watching oversized physical freaks violently moving (or preventing) an oval-shaped inflatable piece of pigskin across painted white lines.  More importantly, the game serves as a venue for (mostly) males to come together in celebration of the very principles we as modern Americans hold near and dear.
Continue reading The Return of Football—America’s Game →