Friday night high school football games are big doings in southern Appalachia. The games are attended by people who are die hard fans-the kind that sit on cold concrete bleachers in 30 degree weather just to cheer the home town team on to victory.
Tipper
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Since my youth Fall & Football have gone together like Dressing & Cranberry Sauce. My Dad and I would attend as many games as we could then when I started High School I played all four years even though it meant walking home fourteen miles many evenings after practice. While in college I coached Swain JVs one year and then coached Varsity at Cherokee for a year. I then went to work in Law Enforcement which meant I worked home games and traveled with the team for several years. My son also played for years which meant we had to be there, now one of our grandsons is a Senior and one of Swain’s Captains and starts on offense and defense, week before last he was a Honorable Mention WNC Player of the week. Since we are going into the forth round of the playoffs we will be traveling over four hours this week to sit in the cold at MT. Gilead, NC. Since we were State Champs in 2011, Regional Champs in 2012 and will be playing for Regional Champs this week and State Champs next week if we win Regional we have fourteen or fifteen week seasons which we love every minute of. As Bear Bryant said “Football isn’t a matter of life and death, it’s much more important than that.”
2 cool 2 be forgotten!
I remember accompanying my now ex-husband who played in football games when we lived in Georgia. I always took a big quilt along to cushion that cold metal bench and wrap around me. For a while there, I guess people in the stands were calling me The Quilt Lady and some had no idea what I looked like because I bundled that thing around me so thoroughly.
I didn’t know that until one day I saw someone I recognized from the games elsewhere and went up and introduced myself. They didn’t recognize me but started talking about a lady on the benches wrapped up in a quilt. I said, “That’s me.” And they said, “Oh, you’re The Quilt Lady.” I thought “what?” but then I knew what they’d been calling me. LOL
From then on though, I made it a point to wait to wrap up until the game started thinking it was friendlier, and I did make some new friends after that.
God bless.
RB
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We only had a daughter. She played volleyball, basketball and softball. That didn’t leave much time for football or much of anything else. At our age we prefer the inside sports like volleyball and basketball.
When I lived in the Northeast, and in high school, we used to attend the football games on Thanksgiving Day. Then we would hurry home for our Thanksgiving dinner. Sometimes, we would go to my aunt’s house about two hours away and that would spoil the chance to attend the local H.S. game. That, however, was a very, very long time ago.
Tipper,
Not me! I love football, but I quit
doing the Friday nite thing soon as
my oldest girl finished doing the
“flag girl thing.” …Ken
Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!
Tipper,
I forgot to add the most important thing…after he says they commenced to go home.
The one bunch that didn’t have so much stuff on them, is I guess the winner and they is a jumpin’ and yellin’ and they all gather in the middle with the bunch agin and begin to hug each other, and shake each others hands and all run out of that pasture like they never fit a’tall…
Tipper,
Football around here sometimes starts on Thursday night and goes thru Sunday evening and sometimes
just until morning on Monday, causing the Sunday 11:00 PM news to be late! Then of course there is the “after cup” of the weekend course with Monday night football, so that little dose will keep you fixed till Thursday or Friday night again! LOL
I loved the description of Football by Andy Griffith long before his famous shows…
He did comic albums!..One that I loved and still have buried with my old albums was called “Football”…He describes the first time he goes to a football game….He said something like,
“They all gather up in the cow pasture not far frum the barn, grown men, womern and chilren!
“It seems to him, like the grown men divide up and fight over this here funny shaped brown punkin’. It started when the one in the stripped shirt yells and whistles and the men commendst to fight and yell and try to grab that “brown thang” and run frum one end or the other without dropping it or steppin’ in something. Then the folks that are standin’ and sittin’, yell and clap somethin’ awful and a band plays music…You would’ve thunk this here fit was over, but no, they gather up again in the middle of that cow pasture, a whistle blows and they start the fit over that “funny punkin ball” agin til one bunch gets down to the other end of the pasture and the other side of the pastures folks beginst to yell and scream!..This goes on till one bunch gets tired, or covered in something and/or grabs that brown funny shaped thang and all go home!”
Some of the games I have seen remind me of just this description of football.
Thanks Tipper,
Sorry Andy, I know I didn’t do your description of football justice!
I remember doing those kind of nights. Our son who is 36 played, and 6 years later, Sarah was a cheerleader for 4 years. There were many cold, rainy, snowy nights.
Hope your team won!
I was never a big sports fan, but since I played in the high school marching band, I went to every high school football game. Got pretty cold this time of year in East Tennessee.
Did you ever sit under a flimsy umbrella while sleet pelted players, field, and fans? I did with a teen-years friend. Her Dad never missed a game even traveling to remote mountain communities. With five daughters, I suppose he needed a dose of manly pursuits.
One of my favorite times at MHS was going to the football games. I was just thinking last night, if I was in Murphy, I would be at the game – even if it IS freezing 😀
Around here too, usually not freezing though.
Nope, not my idea of a fun time. I don’t like to be cold.