The Wonderful world of sports

One of my favorite memories from my childhood revolved around sports.  My first introduction to the world of sports was listening to professional baseball games on the radio in the car, especially if we were driving home later in the evening.  My dad had been a pretty good baseball player in high school, so of course he enjoyed watching or listening to broadcasts of MLB games.  I don't think I remember watching any games on tv,  but I do have such vivid memories of those radio broadcasts.  Even today, if I happen to catch a live broadcast of a game on the radio, I stop and listen to it for a few minutes .It brings back fond memories of riding in the back seat of the car (with no air conditioning, of course, and no seat belt!)  looking out the window on a crystal clear summer night  and hearing the soothing voice of the announcer as he describes every play in the game.
My dad also umpired little league and Babe Ruth baseball games.  For several summers during my late elementary and early junior high years ( yes, I am so old that they still called it junior high school)  I would go with him to the ball field nearly every night he was there.  While he umpired, I would go play on the playground, run in and out of the rec center, run up and down the main street  (it was closed to traffic) as well as visit the concession  stand several times a night.  These were glorious summer days for me---so much fun playing, eating and watching baseball.  When I thnk about how much junk food I consumed each night---because everything was so very cheap---I am shocked I turned out as healthy as I did!!   And, I did all of this with no parental supervision.  (My dad was there, but he was busy calling balls and strikes!) Also, when I look back at the freedom I had to just enjoy being a kid at the local baseball field and the adjoining  playground and how much I  LOVED being there, I am saddened to think that my own children have grown up in a world so completely opposite of this.  I don't think they ever did anything or went anywhere without an adult until they were in their early teens. Oh, how I wish it could have been different for them, but this is the world we live in now.
With all of these happy baseball memories, one would think I would be a crazed baseball fan in my adult years.  In fact, I am not much of a baseball fan at all.  But, football.  Oh, football is another story. It all started when my sister and I cheered for the Sandston Jets in  the early 70's--basically a pop warner type league.  It was here that we began to understand the game of football.

I was never quite sure why our team name was the  Jets  but our uniforms were  like Scottish highlanders. It looked great it pictures but we were supposed to be cheerleaders. The little "tams" and scarf thing clearly were not conducive to  cheerleading routines.

In 1971 we had kind of gotten interested in pro football. The NFL was not huge like it is today and basically you had one game to watch in your area on Sunday, and you had the Monday night football game.  That was it.  (If I had to go back to that now, I don't know how I could survive the season. )   The Super Bowl wasn't even close to what it is now.  It was usually held on Sunday afternoon, with no pregame concert or half-time extravaganza.  And, nobody had Super Bowl parties.  (The game was over in enough time to have dinner, watch the "Wonderful World of Disney" and then go to bed).

The !972 Super Bowl was held on Jan 17th (in the current NFL, the  playoffs are barely getting started at this point in January).  My sister and I decided to have a friendly wager between the two teams who were playing

Since she was the oldest, my sister got to pick her team first.  She picked the Dolphins because, like all girls at that age know, it doesn't matter how good the team is....what matters is that they have "pretty colors" on their uniforms.  So, as luck would have it, I got the Cowboys.   Well, let's just say the rest is history.  I took the team with the less pretty uniform and never looked back.  And so began my roller coaster sports ride as a Dallas Cowboys fan.  And, my sister?  Well, she hung on for a while...those Miami colors are hard to beat... but she married a die hard Packers fan.  So these days ,she thinks green and gold are the prettiest colors of all :)