GGGOOOAAAALLLLL! Urging American soccer haters to reconsider their position
It’s a slippery slope being a fan of The Beautiful Game. One day, you’re minding your own business, blowing the blood vessels in your eyeballs by blowing your much-maligned vuvuzela. There you are, rooting for France, throwing back mojitos at Vagabond during lunch in South Park on a Thursday, alongside the business set, who’ve sneaked away from their jobs because 90 minutes of footie and a cocktail will bring them a sliver of joy in the drudgery of an otherwise craperrific day in a whole endless string of them. Soon, you find yourself so charmed by the exuberant fans of the other team that you bid adieu to Handball Henri to jump up and down and shout “Viva Mexico!” with everyone else in the place.
You’re caught up in the thrill, and your little world is cracked open wide by the immediate connection between you and human beings of every culture on the planet. You’re excited for Mexico, sure, but now you really can’t wait to root, root, root for the home team the following morning. And the next thing you know, you find out you’re a traitor to America. Huh?
Certain right-wing fundies have been studying their talking points again and collectively smearing the World Cup, the U.S. men’s soccer team and, presumably, the ubiquitous soccer mom. In recent weeks, these vocal, elitist xenophobes have called soccer “a poor man’s or poor woman’s sport,” one that liberals “jam… down our throat” as part of the “browning of America.” Because baseball is stacked with freckle-faced redheads.
“It doesn’t matter how you try to sell it to us,” said Glenn Beck in one of his tirades. “It doesn’t matter how many celebrities you get. It doesn’t matter how many bars open early. It doesn’t matter how many beer commercials they run: We don’t want the World Cup. We don’t like the World Cup. We don’t like soccer. We want nothing to do with it.” Beck the Troglodyte went on to mention the hooliganism perpetrated by hooligans before offering proof of our more civilized society: “I haven’t seen the baseball riots.” Apparently, the ever-present bench brawl doesn’t factor into Beck’s we’re-superior equation of sports-etiquette.
Oh, Glenn, you cotton-headed ninny muggins! You make me want to get all Zizou on your ass.
Have you never heard of the Cleveland Indians’ Ten-Cent Beer Night riot of 1974? What about Disco Demolition Night of 1979? Or does your selective comprehension of history exclude the events of history?
I would think you, of all people, would be incensed that fans rioted against an honest-to-God homegrown genre of music at Comiskey Park. What’s more American than disco? Thanks to disco, “YMCA” is played at stadiums (and weddings and bat-mitzvahs) all across your favorite country. And Gary Glitter may have been disco in costume only (and British, to boot), but he gave the American fans you hold up as examples of refined behavior the never-ending opportunity to drunkenly chant duhn-duhn-duuuunh-duh-HAY!-duhn-duhn-duhn-duhn-duhn-duuuuhn-duhn-HAY!
Frankly, that and the apathetic wave are more annoying than one honking vuvuzela blown into your ear at close range.
Also, news flash: America’s favorite pastime wasn’t even invented by Americans. The English invented it. Football? English blokes. Basketball? Wave to Canada, Glenn. You can probably see the socialists from your porch. OK, how about golf? you might ask. Well, other than not being invented in America, there’s little agreement as to its origins. I’d put my money on China since the Chinese make all our shit.
With a need for stop-start-stop action as desperate as the tea baggers’ need for spell check on protest signs, the Glenn Beckians don’t have the attention span for a sport with no commercial breaks. A Wall Street Journal study of four NFL games from last season found the average amount of play time was 11 minutes. In essence, an American football game is a three-hour block of beer-gulping, ball-scratching, slow-it-down-so-I-can-grasp-it time for Neanderthals who only understand domination and a playbook.
And fútbol? With one 15-minute half separating 90 minutes of non-stop running, this difficult sport has more intensity, agility, athleticism, power, control, finesse, creativity, innovation, nuance, grace and true teamwork than any other sport I can think of. Ours is definitely not the best team on Earth, but the U.S. men’s soccer team is the best of us, and any bloviating ethnocentrist in a Brooks Brothers suit should be able to get behind that team, which last Friday played a match complete with America’s favorite dramatic elements:
After an excruciating first half, the U.S. came back (overcoming hardship) from a debilitating 0-2 deficit to Slovenia, the smallest country competing (David and Goliath). Landon Donovan (the boy next door) patiently crafted the first goal just minutes into the second half, and the way the ball left his toe, soared across the field and into the corner of the net was nearly lyrical (the hero comes through).
Michael Bradley, the coach’s son (hello, Lifetime Television for women) tied things up with a second goal. Our goalkeeper, Tim Howard (one of the best in the world), dove and leapt to stop several dangerous attacks. And what should have been the third and winning goal (defying the odds) was taken away as quickly as it had happened (heartbreak) by a call so egregious (disbelief) that the announcers apologized and the rookie ref may be expelled from all future matches (vindication). Now the question remains: Can the U.S. overcome such a psychological test and advance to the next round? If we didn’t adore this kind of drama, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition wouldn’t exist.
The U.S. finishes the first round the day this issue hits the street. Whatever happens, the tournament continues until July 11. C’mon. Blow that vuvuzela. Even if it’s just to annoy your dogmatic neighbors.
(As published on June 23, 2010 in San Diego CityBeat.)
Divine Intervention or An OCD Problem
I was working this morning on a Very Important Post about the economy and whether it’s getting better, when I stopped to take a phone call. Thanks to the convergence of the oil crisis, my midlife crisis and my crisis of confidence, the conversation with my friend ran right over the start time of the Mexico/France World Cup match, which I was supposed to be watching with a bunch of hooligans down at Vagabond. When I finally hung up, I dashed to the bedroom where I stripped out of my pajamas and put on a bra, a grey tank top and a pair of jeans sans undies. Who had time for such frivolity? I had a soccer match to watch and I couldn’t be bothered to find a pair of undergarments that weren’t aerodynamically purposeful.
In the bathroom, I threw on a military cap to cover the disaster zone known as hair-slept-on-when-wet, and frantically scrubbed my teeth with my finger and a little water. It was as I swept some blusher over my face that I noticed a dark red, asymmetrical blotch on my left cheek. I froze. Oh, my God, I thought. Is that another skin cancer?
I’m still adjusting to the battle wound left by the removal of the one on my chest three weeks ago.
I rubbed my face and realized with great relief that it wasn’t a basal cell carcinoma, but a dab of St. Dalfour’s Pomegranate-Raspberry preserves. Good thing I’m not a catastrophizer, because I might have already envisioned myself on my deathbed, telling my husband to marry a nicer, less complicated, more petite woman and whispering to my daughter to be happy, all through barely moveable lips, what with the giant chunk of my face sliced away and all. Imagine what a waste of energy that would have been.
With the near-death experience avoided, I swung my bag across my body, grabbed my camera and headed out the door. I left my beloved vuvuzelas at home. Vivre la France!, I planned to scream, instead.
But before I could settle in and cheer for the team that was not the favorite of the crowd, I took a few pictures. And then, while scratching an itch on the back of my left thigh, I felt a lump. Not a small lump, mind you. But a very big, angry, lumpy lump. Like, the mother of all varicose veins kind of lump. It was a lump the size of a giant oil spill, and for a split second, my heart was again in my throat. But before I passed out right there in Vagabond, spilling my mojito down the front of my pants giving the appearance of having lost all bladder control, I quietly excused myself from the conversation I was now engaged in, and bee-lined for the bathroom.
I shut the door behind me and pushed the button on the handle to lock myself in. Then faster than you can say Viva Mexico!, I unzipped my jeans and thrust my left hand down my pants leg where I found not a boil or a tumor, but a pair of bunched up underwear.
I watched my (mortified) reflection in the mirror as I held them up in the dim light. For a second or so, I fretted about how I was going to subtly transfer them to my purse, which I’d left on a chair at the bar, when it occurred to me—again, thanks to the mirror mocking me from across the room—that I could wear them. And what could be more subtle than that? Sure they were gently worn. But they were black and matched my bra: A message from God, if I’ve ever had one.
I hurried to wiggle out of my jeans, draped them over a shoulder and balanced, naked, on top of my tan, Rocket Dog flip-flops, smushing the sandal part beneath my feet. I fumbled to unfurl the little ball of silky fabric—which turned out to be navy blue, not black, evidence that there is no God and that this was all just the embarrassing fluke of a lazy woman who doesn’t put her clothes in the hamper when she should—turning them around and over to find the front, hoping like hell nobody would walk in.
Did I lock the door? Oh my God, did I lock the door? I don’t remember if I locked the door. I stopped what I was doing and stared at the handle. The handle stared at me. It was a showdown. The button was pushed in. But you never know. Sometimes the button is pushed in but it doesn’t work and the door isn’t really locked at all and then anyone could come in and see me standing naked in a restaurant during the lunch hour and holy crap am I neurotic or what? I decided to trust it, hustled into my clothes and made a mental note to get a Xanax prescription when I visit my internist next month.
And voila. I rejoined the cheering masses and transferred my allegiance to the winning team.
Tomorrow, I’ll be watching the US play Slovenia from Café Calabria. And I’ll be wearing clean underwear at the outset.