I must confess the condition I’m in, a condition that may
not afflict other grandmas and great-grandmas. Or maybe I’ll be surprised. Who
knows?
My confession is, I am in love with Peyton Manning. Must
warn my kids to not flip out on that confession. In fact, he is a bit younger
than my kids, so it’s OK my darling children. I warn my wonderful sons that I
am not in love with the quarterbacks of their favorite teams – the Chicago
Bears and Green Bay Packers. Yeah, those teams are kinda good, and the Packers
quarterback is sort of cute too. But I’m not in love with those teams, or for
that matter I’m not in love with the Denver Broncos, for whom charming Manning
tosses a football. I just think Manning is exceptional, which he proved again
this week by defeating the San Diego Chargers. As I watched that game, and
listened to the exuberant broadcasters, it did not escape my notice that, as
the voices remarked, we were watching one of the greatest quarterbacks of all
time and a future NFL Hall of Fame member, the quarterback who has thrown the
most touchdown passes ever!
For the uninitiated, NFL is the National Football League. It
may seem odd that I, a grandma and great-grandma now, am a NFL football
fanatic. I rejoice on that first Sunday every September when my favorite sport
to watch returns to the TV. But I come by my NFL addition honestly. Got it straight
from my Dad, then channeled through my hubby, and finally sparked by sons.
Dad was the best football instructor. We watched every
Sunday. Mom didn’t stay around. Dad was the sports fan and lived by the radio
when it broadcast both football and baseball games. When the NFL made it to TV,
that’s where we were on any Sunday. One of my favorite childhood memories was
hanging out with Dad watching football on Sunday afternoons. Dad always had a
snack, usually cheese and crackers, the crumbs of which often fell to the
carpet, where they stayed. That’s because Mom wasn’t around. But we lived in
the country. That big old country house had mice. Those mice knew where to go
for cheese and crackers on Sundays. Yep. Right at Dad’s feet. Now every member
of my family is an animal lover, even Dad. So instead of jumping up and trying
to dispatch those mice, Dad just kept feeding them. I watched, cause they were
so cute. In fact, they almost became tame and our house pets. At one point in
time, Mom got upset with the invading varmints and set out mouse traps. But,
when she wasn’t around, if I heard a trap snap, I ran to liberate the trapped
mouse. After all, it may have been one of Dad’s football Sunday pets. But what
happened was our country home became inhabited by the strangest bunch of
crippled mice ever seen. Well that trap was awful. It broke their little legs,
or snapped off their little tales. And that just made Dad and I love them more,
so Dad kept feeding them, while I imagined I was Disney’s Cinderella for whom
those mice would make a magnificent ball gown some day. That was my favorite
movie when I was small.
Nurtured by Dad, my love of football continued into
marriage, where we both shared a fondness for the game. As children, especially
sons, arrived, I grew even more attuned to football, a liking shared by my
boys. It continues to this day, and one son texts he can’t stand Peyton Manning
cause he beat his Bears, and the other son sends texts to me that his Green Bay
Packers are gonna’ eat Peyton’s lunch. Oh yeah. You better watch out. That
Super Bowl isn’t too far away. But hey, Peyton and the Broncos made it to the
Super Bowl last year, and it was a fiasco. But things improve (Hopefully the
defense!) and it may be that the Broncos are on the way again.
Funny, as I scrounged my mind to decide what to write about
this week, for those few devoted readers (Thank You So Much!) I couldn’t
remember anything worth telling about The Lunch Bunch, who have been pretty
tame lately. Really ladies! Let’s get going! Even my critters seem to be tired
out and sound asleep. I thought about those monarch butterflies whose flight
paths take them right over us. That’s amazing. But I don’t know much about
butterflies, even though I’d like to. Then brain kicked into gear. ‘Write about
what you know,’ it told me. And today, that would be Peyton Manning and
football.
Grandmas and great-grandmas unite, and yell “Go Peyton!”
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