A mystery revealed

It is no big secret that I am fanatical about sports. I'm less fanatical about beer, but not by much. I grew up in a house where those two things were staples to most everyday activities. I lived in Oklahoma at the height of the Barry Switzer era. I watched Wayman Tisdale play ball from the second row on more than one occasion. I was there that fateful day in Norman when KU beat the mighty Sooners on their home field. I was also there a when they put a hurtin on Colorado like I had never seen. I saw the Cowboys blow the Superbowl when I was about 8 and I have hated them every minute of everyday since then. I watched the 1988 tournament. You know the one I'm talking about, when KU and OU played for the title. When OU was a much better team, but couldn't stop Manning and the Miracles. I watched and my Dad taped it.

My Dad worked in the oil fields in Oklahoma during the boom in the eighties. He did very well for us. He knew people that knew people that would call when they didn't want their tickets, and he always took me. When "the game" was on, I was always welcome to watch it, even though I wasn't allowed to say much or ask questions, I was allowed to be there.

I started playing softball when I was five. I played every spring, summer and fall until I was fourteen. I played in Nationals. I played in the USSA World tournament twice and I played for a team that did nothing but play tournaments. We were a hand picked team that was expected to win. I started playing basketball when I was in 7th grade. I was tall and athletic and really pretty good at it. I played until I moved to Hutchinson in the middle of my sophomore year. In all I'll bet I played in close to a thousand games in those two sports. Wanna take a guess how many my dad watched? Five.

This is not a blog about poor poor me, my daddy didn't love me whaa whaa whaa. My dad was a raging alcoholic and that was the single most important thing in his life right up until I was about 25. I got my love of sports from my dad. My love of Nebraska and my love of the Chiefs. They all came from him. For what ever else he didn't give me, he gave me that. To this day it is one of the few things that I can sit and engage that man in an actual conversation. Even though he has been sober for ten years, he is still a man of few words. Sports are the singular topic that I can chat with him about. Once in a great while about money or if the girls are sick, but since I have no money and I don't have Munchausen by Proxy those topics don't come up often.

I know that my dad loves me and he always did. There was just a time in my life when the only way to spend time with him was "watching the game" and as an adult, I still "watch the game" just so I know that if he calls and wants to talk about it, I will be able to.