hannah and caroline and me
(part forty-two)
((my first real mistake as a parent))


mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys...

or football fans.

i was having a conversation a couple days ago with a buddy about how i loved a (good-) spirited debate. surprising, right? my definition of debate, though, especially in the realm of this blog or on facebook must be naive or misshapen or skewed or something. if i've learned anything from HACAM and facebook over the past five years, it's that i am "dangerous", "stupid", "sexist", a "bammer", a "mind-reader", "cold-hearted", "mean", "bad for my church", "tactless", among other qualifiers, most of these from people that i've enjoyed, at some point in my life, fraternizing with. it's hard to argue with any of them i guess. mainly, because if i do, people will call me names again.

i imagine these, my most glowing qualities, come out and to the surface while i am watching an alabama football game. since hannah was born, absolutely nothing has changed with my attitude or the way i comport myself during these games, at least the ones that mean something to the greater "process" and the ultimate end of a conference and/or national title. i clap and yell with glorious support when the team executes a play to perfection. i flail and moan and kick and scream and hurl venom towards the field or television when something goes wrong.

all the while, hannah (and now caroline) are somewhere in the vicinity of the game, too, taking it all in.

readers of this blog that don't use the word "fuck", don't worry (yet). neither of the girls have taken to the interwebs with their own journals contributing to the downfall of civilization by using their own variations on their daddy's "dirty words". that'll come, though. don't you worry.

when we got in the car after the game last friday, though, indisputable evidence of my (and her mommy's) influence poured out of the first baby girl. as we pulled away from rebecca's, hannah started crying. soon, her crying turned to bawling and within a few seconds, she was inconsolable. after letting her cry it out for a few minutes, i asked why she was so upset. it was because she was worried that a friend, whose parents root for auburn, would brag and make fun of her the next time they saw each other. damn.

was she upset that alabama lost the game? maybe, but not so much in the literal outcome of the literal game. she was upset that her friends who had chosen to root for auburn would have something on her the next time they got together. i resemble this sentiment, wholeheartedly.

i love a spirited debate, mainly because, removed from the subject in question, whether that be a football team or lunch at krystal, i pride myself on being able to separate the sinner from the sin, if you will. if you don't like alabama as much as i do, that's fine. if you think a whopper is tastier than my little piece of heaven, that's fine, too. i'll argue why i think i am right, or feel right. i might even argue why i think you are wrong. i am not going to call you a douchebag, even if i think you are being one. that's just the way it is.

kids, specifically my first grader, can't be this rational. not yet. kids are the worst trash-talkers, because it's all emotion that's vomiting from their mouth. they don't care about making good points. they just "nanny, nanny, poo-poo" all over their classmates faces with no regard for the emotional trainwrecks they are leaving in their wake. i know this because i was the worst at it. i can specifically remember an instance from my childhood when i lost a friend for over a month because i kicked his ass in tecmo bowl and wouldn't stop talking about it for a week. it was "mean". "tactless". "stupid". all of those. i suppose i knew better. my mom would've kicked my ass had she known about it. but i didn't go to school with my mom. and hannah doesn't go to school with hers. or her dad. we can't protect her from kids being cruel. we just get to pick up the pieces after someone's broken her heart.

the sad part about that meltdown in the car after the iron bowl was how predictable it was. by my injecting her, week after week, year after year, season after season with the idea that football and alabama football is worth giving your friends a hard time about, i let the meltdown happen. i produced it. it was my creation.

as i said, i know kids are mean. that part i can't change. they are all emotion. it's part of their charm and part of the reason i want to stick my head through a glass door half the time.

i also know kids are impressionable. and i've impressed upon my child that she should give a shit when a friend of hers who has parents that have impressed upon them to be an auburn fan comes bragging about a victory in a football game. because i've done this, i've given her a reason to worry about something that she didn't ask for.

that kind of sucks.

as she gets older, i'll have to make sure she is able and trained to respond to others with something more substantial than tears. i'll have to impress upon her the value in (good-) spirited debate.

then she won't have any friends either.