still...walkin' a bit slow
I got an e-mail a few days before Thanksgiving, from one of the former carpool folks. We're all still good friends, even if our kids go to different schools now and the subject was the Turkey Bowl. It read something like this:
You are invited to play in the Turkey Bowl, 11:00 at the soccer field. The favorites are the Steeler Fan family who have brought in ringers from the north.
My first question was...what's a Turkey Bowl? The last thing I did entitled "Turkey Bowl" involved bowling pins, a frozen bird and the smooth floor of a drinking establishment..and it was a long time ago. This was on a soccer field...far less conducive to sliding frozen turkeys into bowling pins. I then got it explained. Family flag football. Pick teams and hope you don't embarass yourself in front of your kids. I figured...sounds like fun. The youngster was psyched. The wife was not interested.
So the youngster and I showed up at 11:00, and nobody was there...yet. Everyone showed up eventually, including 22 total Steeler Fan family members...16 from Pennsylvania/Ohio. They started picking teams, trying to figure out an equitable way to do it and the question came up...well, who's the oldest guy here? OK, color me shocked. Weighing in at a huge 49 years, that award went to the lumberyard.
So the teams were picked and the game was played. Twelve on each side, with the rest (mostly wives and a grandmother, but a few dads) deciding to "observe." (Guys younger than me volunteering to "observe", but that's beside the point.) One quarterback with everyone else running all over the place yelling "I'm open." We played until one team had seven touchdowns. "First team to seven" was an arbitrary rule made when the score was six to four (just counting by touchdowns) and everyone wanted the game to be over soon. The youngster and I were on the winning team, and represented ourselves well. We each had one interception and one touchdown.
Then there was, and is, the aftermath...where I realize that yes, I was the oldest guy playing. I'm pitiful! Thursday night I was walking very slow, complaining if I had to go upstairs to get something. I went to the grocery store Saturday morning. You know how they have those crosswalk things in front of the store with stop signs on either side to allow people to walk in between traffic? I was there. Cars were stopped to let me cross. I tried to hurry up, so as to not inconvenience them even more than I already was. Tried is the operative word. I tried to run, or at least jog, but gave up after the first three steps...and just walked as fast as I could without it hurting too much. It's now Monday, and my legs still haven't recovered completely. I'm much better now, but still...please don't ask me to run....yet.
You are invited to play in the Turkey Bowl, 11:00 at the soccer field. The favorites are the Steeler Fan family who have brought in ringers from the north.
My first question was...what's a Turkey Bowl? The last thing I did entitled "Turkey Bowl" involved bowling pins, a frozen bird and the smooth floor of a drinking establishment..and it was a long time ago. This was on a soccer field...far less conducive to sliding frozen turkeys into bowling pins. I then got it explained. Family flag football. Pick teams and hope you don't embarass yourself in front of your kids. I figured...sounds like fun. The youngster was psyched. The wife was not interested.
So the youngster and I showed up at 11:00, and nobody was there...yet. Everyone showed up eventually, including 22 total Steeler Fan family members...16 from Pennsylvania/Ohio. They started picking teams, trying to figure out an equitable way to do it and the question came up...well, who's the oldest guy here? OK, color me shocked. Weighing in at a huge 49 years, that award went to the lumberyard.
So the teams were picked and the game was played. Twelve on each side, with the rest (mostly wives and a grandmother, but a few dads) deciding to "observe." (Guys younger than me volunteering to "observe", but that's beside the point.) One quarterback with everyone else running all over the place yelling "I'm open." We played until one team had seven touchdowns. "First team to seven" was an arbitrary rule made when the score was six to four (just counting by touchdowns) and everyone wanted the game to be over soon. The youngster and I were on the winning team, and represented ourselves well. We each had one interception and one touchdown.
Then there was, and is, the aftermath...where I realize that yes, I was the oldest guy playing. I'm pitiful! Thursday night I was walking very slow, complaining if I had to go upstairs to get something. I went to the grocery store Saturday morning. You know how they have those crosswalk things in front of the store with stop signs on either side to allow people to walk in between traffic? I was there. Cars were stopped to let me cross. I tried to hurry up, so as to not inconvenience them even more than I already was. Tried is the operative word. I tried to run, or at least jog, but gave up after the first three steps...and just walked as fast as I could without it hurting too much. It's now Monday, and my legs still haven't recovered completely. I'm much better now, but still...please don't ask me to run....yet.
Labels: Sports
John put this out here at 9:04 AM
2 Comments:
LOL John. The "turkey bowl" concept must be a particularly northern tradition -- and perhaps so geographically determined as to have originated FROM PA and OH (which is where I am from and where I spend my Thanksgivings) and, I must admit, where I actually witnessed a Turkey Bowl this year from the window of my mother's house in Ohio! Just for your information, I have found that true turkey bowls are generally fully lubricated events, and I am surprised that your age put you at the oldest player. I would have thought that you would have been an average-aged player, although "in your mind" you would have still been 25 and played accordingly (which would have accounted for the pain later -- and thus the true reason for the lubrication). The Lubrication helps to ease the pain -- both from the game, and from the recognition that one ISN'T 25 anymore. :-) Really, the turkey bowl is a subject on which I could hold forth for hours...and I'm ALWAYS an observer.
Well, this one came with actual flags (for flag football), and most of the participants were between the ages of 7 and 14, so the alcoholic lubrication was kept to a minimum. There were "after game beers", but we also had lots of juice boxes. It really was a family event, so I think our age range was well below the norm for these things.
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