On fandom

I grew up a rabid University of North Carolina sports fan. My dad and several of my aunts and uncles attended the school in the 1970s, and the devotion they showed their alma mater (rather through genetics or osmosis) passed along to me. I grew up on Woody Durham-called games of often pitiful football games (I remember hoping one year for a Liberty Bowl berth …) and the excellent but not-quite-good-enough basketball teams of the late 1980s (an upset of Number 1 seed Oklahoma in the 1988 NCAA tournament a high point). I was a fanatic in every sense of the word. In the 1995 final four, I had to go up to my room and listen to the Final Four game against Arkansas on the radio rather than watch; the game was too close and I couldn’t stand the anxiety. (They wound up losing.) I was distraught when the football team (ranked in the top 10!) blew a 17-3 fourth quarter lead at Virginia in 1996 which would have given the team their first win in Charlottesville since before I turned 1.

Then I went to school in Chapel Hill. If possible, things got worse. I attended all the football games, despite the ineptitude that was the Carl Torbush tenure. I went to all the basketball games I could, despite this requiring picking up tickets at 6 am Saturday mornings and despite this being the Matt Doherty era – I went to at least 15 games my junior year, when the team went 8-20. In other words, I bled Carolina blue, win or lose, thick or thin.

Things did not change after I graduated. There is something extraordinarily magical about the University of North Carolina. If you did not attend the school, I don’t think I can adequately describe just what happens to you when you join that brotherhood (girls allowed). From the beautiful campus (particularly in Spring), the school’s history, the sports, the people … those four years leave a permanent mark. And that mark includes living and breathing Tar Heel sports. That mark has followed me to New Jersey.

That brings us to this year. And what a year it’s been. Between one full disappointing basketball season (with another in the early stages) and a football team that both disappointed on the field (from possible conference championship to 7-5) and off the field (taking money from agents? cheating on papers?), this is a hard time to be a Tar Heel fan. As a fanatical follower, I take losses hard and react to off-field transgressions with anger. I shout obscenities and curse opposing players (especially those in the uglier shade of blue). In other words, I behave in a way that would horrify me if I saw others doing.

I thought of this again during the Cleveland-Miami basketball game last night. The Cleveland fans feel betrayed because Lebron James left their team and their city. That betrayal has led to hatred – pure, absolute hatred of a player they once adored. During the game, they booed mercilessly, chanted things intended to hurt him (“Scottie Pippen!” “Akron hates you!”), and some even threw things at the Heat bench during the game. All because the fans feel that this player – someone they’ve never interacted with personally – owed them more. This player, who as that term implies, makes a living playing a game in front of spectators, has disrespected them and created a city-wide feeling of having been left at the altar, dumped for a more attractive city. And this devotion has turned rancid, and these people – people who I assume are well-meaning and mild-mannered during the day – turned into rabid, loud, hate-filled patrons in the night. They came prepared, with signs, shirts, props, and more, with one goal in mind: to show one man how much they hate him. We are talking about sports here. People don’t put this much thought into protesting homophobia or the rising deficit – things that actually matter.

And I can say with full self-awareness, that I would have probably done the same.

I can also say that this is not healthy. My blood pressure should not rise and fall with every Larry Drew II turnover or TJ Yates poorly-thrown pass. I’d like to say that with this self-awareness, I’ve decided to step back and re-evaluate my priorities. Perhaps skipping a few ballgames when the team is almost guaranteed to infuriate me would be a good idea. Trying to dampen the affect wins or losses have on my happiness would probably improve my life and make me a generally more pleasant fellow to be around. All of this I know. In my head, it makes perfect sense.

But I can’t do that. I live and bleed Carolina blue. I grew up a Tar Heel fan in Durham, listening to those insufferable snobs go on and on about Christian Laettner and whine about any call that didn’t go Coach K’s (hereafter referred to as “rat face devil”) way. I spent four years immersed in Carolina blue, immersed in Carolina legend … how can I not be this way? Why would I want to be any other way? I’m happy with my delusion: sports matter, Carolina sports matter, and the players care about that legacy as much as I do.

Which is why, if the Heels don’t beat Kentucky on Saturday, you’ll be able to read my “end of the world” updates on Twitter or see me sitting dejectedly in the living room for the rest of the day. Because despite my self-awareness, I’m still a Tar Heel born and a Tar Heel bred. And more than likely, I’ll be a Tar Heel dead.

Let’s just hope my heart can hold out a while before that last part comes true.

Midwinter's night dream turned death approaches! Repent!

It's not fair to say I'm afraid of the dark. I just fear things while in the dark.

Saturday night, in bed at the home of the in-laws, the power went out. It was just before 1 AM, and, since I am among the lightest sleepers I know, I woke up. My first thought was, "Someone just cut the power and now they're coming in to get us." This was ridiculous for the following reasons:

1. No criminal would target a parsonage (father-in-law is a minister) as worthy of home invasion.
   
2. I may not be popular, but I certainly haven't got a host of enemies waiting to get me.
3. Most people would logically work their way through a list of some 300 possibilities before arriving at "They've cut the power. This is the end."

But this is what I do. Any noise in the night? "They've come for me." Whether from a deluded sense of self-importance or a heightened sense of stupidity, this is how I function. This is how my mind works. And this last time, I thought, "I guess we all have to die sometime. It would have been nice to live a few more years, but we don't really get to choose. I hope that last Harry Potter is nice. I would have liked to see it."

So if you're counting at home, I've gone from "They're after me! It's over!" to making my peace with death in the span of about 3 minutes. Meanwhile, all that's happened in the world is the power went out - something so routine that most people hardly think twice about it. My wife hardly stirred. Unfortunately, things got worse. After a while, I heard the unmistakable beep of a large truck backing up. Rather than think through the possibilities rationally, I immediately assumed that this was the thieves' truck, in which they would pack everything up before speeding away with a 10-year old television and pictures of Jesus.

It would be a good five minutes before I progressed down the logic tree to, "That's probably Duke Power come to fix the power." Indeed, a few minutes later the power had returned and I was still alive.

But is this any way to live? I'd like to teach my brain to not jump irrationally to the most illogical and far-flung outcome it can think of, but it I couldn't do it in 30 years, what hope do I have now? I guess I'll just have to wait until the next time I wake up in the night, mistake a coat hanging from the wall with another thief in the night come for my comic book collection, and try again.

Mother's Day thoughts

This week's editorial from The News of Orange County

One day is not enough for special women
This Sunday, for the 26th time in her life, my mother will be celebrated, honored and appreciated. I hope all of those things have happened more than 26 times in her life, but they are guaranteed to happen this Sunday, during her 26th May as a mother. Like most children, I can only imagine, looking back on almost 26 years, all the grief I caused the poor woman. (And, though I'd like to think differently, there's probably more grief coming.) I'm at least partly responsible for some of the grey hairs, but I'd be willing to bet that my brothers caused more.

There are few people that I respect more than my mother. The daughter of tobacco farmers, she has worked hard all of her life. I'm not sure, but she would probably tell you that raising four children, separated by less than seven years, may have been even harder than pulling tobacco. However, there were few times when she ever let it show. She was a soccer mom before there were “soccer moms,” driving the four of us around everywhere we needed to go or helping with school projects. She coached a few of our basketball teams, volunteered in each of our schools and even served eight years on the school board.

Impressive as all of that is, I love my mother for the quiet things she has done - the discussions we've had on religion, philosophy or politics and allowing me to develop my own opinions and beliefs. She has challenged me to be more than I thought possible, and she never fails to show how proud she is.

She only gets one day a year, but she has made every one of mine special.

Twenty-six years ago, I made my mom a parent. She made herself a Mother. Happy Mother's Day, mom.

(P.S. We made special sweatshirts for Christmas last year in honor of the horrible sweatshirts my grandmother made us wear for family portraits when we were young.)