Football and Husbands

I am a football widow and my daughters are orphans.

My husband is a football fan, a big numbers guy, and works in Vegas.  Do I need to say more?  I don't even know what a parlay is, but I know he's got great hopes for one.  And he's been eating off of his winnings for the last seven weeks.  So, yeah.  I guess I can't complain.  My very prudent spouse never bets with money he doesn't have to lose, and he never bets on something he's not pretty darn sure he'll win.  So, he and his Dad and our sons Paul and Kevin are bonding over bets he puts down on football games in Vegas.  It's all they talk about when they're together, all they text about when they're not together.  Stats. Injuries. Speculations. Odds.

We girls are like, "Huh?"  Sunday afternoons, we go down to the rec room where the tv is jerry-rigged to a wire, snaked out the corner of the window up to the rabbit ears precariously balanced on

the roof.  The eyeballs of any males in the house, youngest to oldest, are riveted to the television screen. All except for William, maybe, who's usually having a battle with various action figures and chess guys on the table down there, glancing up occasionally to check on the game's progress. Which is what we do. We're checking, but not so much on the games.  We're checking on the boys.  Making sure they're still with us.

 "Who's playing this one?" we ask. Not like it matters that much to us unless it's the Broncos, actually, but we like to pretend to be courteous -- and make sure the men haven't zoned out into football comas.

Distractedly (eyes not leaving the screen) they tell us the score. We ask, "Do we care who wins this one?"  Then we glaze over and pick at our manicures while they explain by how much which team needs to win in order to figure into some complicated gambling schematic that none of us girls will ever understand.  We just wait 'til the end of the long explanation and ask if Daddy will be eating Taco Bell or steak this week.

So, yeah...  It's what we do on Sunday afternoons -- which I can't complain about if it's buying my husband lunch.  And, really, I can't say a word when he comes home from Mass and cooks us all Sunday morning breakfast first. Then sits next to me during the game and tolerates me just grunting at his exclamations of football-play joy or dismay -- while I play on my laptop.

What rests the mind and buoys the spirit differs from one person to another. And that's OK.

Viva la difference!  

And Go Broncos!! 

“And he said unto them,
 'The sabbath was made for man,and not man for the sabbath.'" 
 Mark 2:27