The Bama Dilemma

The plot thickens.

Last week, I pledged my collegiate football loyalties to the Crimson Tide of the University of Alabama, with the sure and certain belief that their season would implode with the magnitude of a supernova.

Okay, so there was a little snag.

In my defense, last Saturday’s Alabama vs. Duke was only televised on pay-per-view. Not feeling equal to explaining to my husband:

1. Why I (of all people) was paying to watch a college football on TV, and
2. Why said college football team happened to be ALABAMA

I thought it best to just postpone my loyalties, insofar as watching was concerned, for another week. Maybe I couldn’t watch the game, but I would still be routing for the Tide in my heart. What difference could it make, really?

Yeah, well, we all know how that turned out. Sorry, Duke. That 62-13 really smarts.

So here we are again. Game Day. Ready to start over. Except that today’s match-up is…damn.

Alabama at Arkansas.

Number 1 vs. Number 10. Tide vs. Hogs. Goliath vs. David.

What shall I do? Oh, what shall I do?

As evidenced by fifteen years of Arkansas loyalty, my team of choice always loses if I watch (or listen to) the game. As further evidenced by Alabama’s cruel and unusual crushing of Duke last week, if I don’t watch the game, my team of choice goes on to a landmark victory. So do I watch? Or no?

The fate of the universe rest on this one decision.

Okay, maybe not. It just feels like it.

I would love to watch this game. Almost as much as I would love to be at this game. Walking down the hill from a tailgate, following the surging crowds down Stadium Drive, climbing into the stands to be enveloped in a sea of red-and-white-clad fans.

But I think I’d better not watch.

I don’t want to be haunted by visions of that sea of red-and-white turning on me like a lynch mob because I was solely responsible for a humiliating defeat on our home field when I could, instead, have handed them a decisive victory over the Number 1 team in the country. At least if I don’t watch, it’s harder to hold me accountable.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

Oh, except: ROLL TIDE ROLL. And I mean that. With every fiber of my being.