25 years ago...

(I wrote this a few weeks ago before I created this blog so I thought I would post it now... )

A few weeks ago I was rummaging through some old mementos and stuff and stumbled across all my old ticket stubs and found the one from Alabama v. Ole Miss October 3, 1981. Section N1, Row 27, Seat 2. I stopped and remember it was my first game in Tuscaloosa and realized that it was about to be 25 years since that first game. WOW! 25 YEARS! TWENTY FIVE F@*K**G YEARS AGO! I said outloud "God I feel old. " And then I started getting nostalgic I realized that a lot has happened in those 25 years. Lots of football games, lots of school, many friends, many life lessons, and lots of change. So last weekend, there I was back in Tuscaloosa on October 7, 2006, on the same exact weekend twenty-five years later. Alabama v. Duke. West Upper Deck, Section R, Row 12, Seat 4. Nearly directly above those same seats 25 years later and this time my Dad and my Mom were in seats 5 and 6 and my roommate Jeff in seat 3. And Also this coming Saturday Jeff and I will be back in Tuscaloosa for Alabama v. Ole Miss . 25 years comes full circle. So during the past couple of weeks I have been thinking back a lot on all the things that have happened in those 25 years and as this weekend has gotten close I have gotten more and more nostalgic and even a little misty eyed. So forgive me as I digress ...It was October 3, 1981 and my Dad was taking me to my first Alabama game in Tuscaloosa. It was the University's 150th Anniversary and Bama was playing the Ole Miss Rebels. Needless to say I was excited! Although I had been going to Alabama football games for a couple of years (most of the big games were played in Birmingham), I had never been to a game in Tuscaloosa. It seemed so far away to me then and I thought I was going on a big trip! I had just turned 11 years old a few weeks before and everything still seemed big and far back then.

As I remember about that day my Dad and I loaded up the gray Plymouth Fury (nicknamed the Silver Dollar) and headed out early that October morning. It was a beautiful fall day, not a cloud in the sky and the deepest blue. Much like last weekend and the one we are suppose to have this coming Saturday. My mom and sister didn't go with us. I am not sure why but my sister was a senior in High School and I was the annoying little brother. So that might have had something to do with it. And also she was madly in love with my future brother-in-law Mike. I am sure they had plans that Saturday. As we drove down Interstate 59, I didn't think we would ever get there. We past the airport, then downtown, Legion Field, the steel mills of west end, and then just a bunch of trees and trees and trees. "Where is this Tuscaloosa place?" I thought. We finally got there and my Dad and I ate lunch at University Mall (which just happens to be built on top of where my dad had gone to elementary school). Finally, we get to the stadium. It was much different than I thought it would be. I guess I pictured every stadium looking like Legion Field since that was the only stadium I had been to before. We walked up to the fence as Bama was beginning their pre-game workouts and I stood waiting for the Man in The Hat. Soon He shuffled out of the tunnel with part of the team. The stadium announcer declared "Ladies and Gentlemen….The Alabama Crimson Tide" and the crowd went nuts. I stood there in awe like I would normally do before the games in Legion Field. Coach Bryant seemed bigger than life. Much like my two grandfather's seemed. He took his place up against the goalpost and watched his Crimson Tide warm up. My Crimson Tide. I am sure I was asking my Dad a million questions. "Why did that player do that?" "Who is that?" "What is the Bear thinking?" "Why are there boy cheerleaders?" "Can I be one?" I always asked tons of silly questions. We went to one of the merchandise stands before the game. I insisted on getting a white Alabama Flag (about 2 x 3) with the old Alabama "A" on it with the elephant stepping through. My Mom still has the flag to this day. We went to our seats and the game began. Bama controlled the game throughout. (Like they did most games in those days). But I remember like yesterday the Rebel Band at halftime playing "Dixie". The stadium went crazy and nearly everyone clapped and sang the words. I couldn't figure out why "our" fans would be cheering for the Ole Miss Band. Dad said that most people from the South like that song. I guess I was too young to have figured out the whole "Southern thing" yet. Alabama won 38 to 7. (Yes I remembered the score without having to look it up. I couldn't remember where I had put my keys last night but I remember a football score from 25 years ago. I am weird). When we left I had to hang out the car window with my flag flapping in the wind. This was before those handy little flags we attach to the car windows nowdays. My Dad made me roll the window up and get back in the car before we got on the Interstate. I begged him to let me wave it all the way to Birmingham but he said the wind would destroy my new flag. I have no doubt that he was really worried that accident-prone Jason would find a way to fall out of the window going 55 miles a hour. How would he explain that one to Mom?

Bama went on to tie for SEC Championship with Georgia that year. Their last championship under Coach Bryant. The Bear would win "315" against Auburn later that year and become the winningest coach in college football history. My sister would graduate from Hewitt-Trussville High School that school year. (Just as I would six years later). She would leave me by myself at home without anyone to pester in the Fall of 82 to go off to college. I think I slept in her bed every night for 3 months missing her. (I know how you feel Chelsey). Coach Bryant would die in early 1983. At that time I did not see how that was possible. He was immortal and a giant. (I would lose the other two giants as well. One way too early in July 1984 and the other in May 2004). My Dad would take me back to Tuscaloosa two years later for my second game there. Again against Ole Miss. I managed to find my way to the Capstone in 1989, graduate in 1993 and go to Law School and begin a career as an attorney. My sister has had three kids with that same guy she chose to spend that fall Saturday with in 1981. And they are still married. (Love ya Mike) My oldest nephew has himself graduated from high school, started college, and turned into an outstanding young man. My niece is as big an Alabama fan as I am and is becoming quite the beautiful young lady and Austen is just as pestering as I was and I love it. Time sure does fly by. Ronald Reagan was the President and now we have his vice-president's son as our current one. The Space Shuttle Columbia would launch for the first time only to be lost in 2003. The President of Egypt would be assassinated in Cairo three days after my first game in Tuscaloosa and later that year a car bomb would exploded in front of the Iraqi Embassy in Beirut and destroy it. The first modern suicide car bombing. Things sound hauntingly familiar doesn't it. I've had many good friends and good times in these past 25 years. Fallen in love a couple of times, cried over broken hearts, buried three grandparents, relationships have ended including a marriage, new ones have begun, changed careers, traveled to 21 states and 4 countries.
Over the past few weeks what I soon began to realize is that although so many things change and seem so different. Some things really stay the same. So on Saturday there I will be. Sitting in one of the grandest cathedrals of college football cheering for my beloved Crimson Tide against the University of Mississippi. I still miss the old stadium announcer and his "Ladies and Gentleman … The Alabama Crimson Tide" when the team comes out for warm ups. But I am sure I will think it and hear his voice in my head like I always do. Also I am sure I will stand up and clap to "Dixie" with the Rebel Band just like all the other good Southerners. Hopefully, The Million Dollar Band will play "Amazing Grace" and Bama will win big. Just like 25 years ago. Here's to 25 more. Roll Tide and Thanks Dad.

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