The Super Bowl is happening this weekend and with it, the end of the football season. It seems a fitting time for me to reflect on the little love affair I’ve had with NFL football for the past six years. It is a bit odd that I picked up football later in life. But like many strange love stories, it started during the Covid shutdown.

I was living alone in Dallas, feeling isolated. My friends there were fearful about contracting the virus, so I found myself spending long stretches of time without human company. Football entered my world simply because it was one of the few places where real humans were doing a real thing, live, in front of me. I watched casually, at first, not caring who won, but eventually I found myself rooting for players and their teams simply because I’d learned their stories: the traded-too-many-times guy who finally thrived, the rookie wide receiver who shocked everyone with a miracle catch, the gifted quarterback who’d spent most of his career buried on a loser team where quarterbacks go to die, only to suddenly be traded to a team where he could thrive. The beauty was that I didn’t pull for just one team…I had several favorites! Watching live football on TV gave me some flavor of the aliveness I valued and was missing.

Recently, my brother, who has watched football his entire life, and understands the game on a much deeper level, has been teaching me about the formations, the strategies, the “chess” behind what can look, at first glance, like guys just crashing into each other. It’s been fun to talk or text with him during games. I noticed we always seemed to pull for the same teams and there’s something touching about that. What is it about these specific teams and players that we both value? My roommates started watching with me and learning football. Then other non-football friends started joining us to watch and experience the “People magazine” version of football through my live commentary. It has become a kind of communal celebratory activity and so much fun.

And now the Super Bowl is here. I’m excited, of course, but instead of feeling the familiar sadness as the season ends, I feel kind of excited about all the time I’ll have available in the off-season. Maybe I’m just a little tired, but it has me wondering whether my love affair with football is more permanently on the wane, making way for new experiences.

I want to be in the aliveness of this beautiful existence and there are many places to find that. And regardless of where that aliveness goes from here, I have loved the world of NFL football.

Anything that you, gentle readers, have committed significant time to that you are considering stepping back from or have recently dropped?

pandemic experiences

A Love Letter to NFL Football