A Super Bowl of tears

Posted Jan 22, 2009 by Mike Winter

Updated Jan 22, 2009 at 02:27 PM

There are many things that bring my daughter to tears. Being told a packet of Kool-Aid is an unacceptable afternoon snack, for instance, or forbidding her from wearing Tinkerbell wings to school. And God forbid if “My Friends Tigger and Pooh” is preempted by something as trivial as, oh, say a presidential inauguration. History, apparently, is for the over-six crowd.

After five years, I like to think I’m fairly attuned to what will and won’t set Tess off. I know if she sees me with a syringe full of bright pink antibiotics (I’ve been assured numerous times that the “bubblegum” flavor claimed on the bottle’s label is a detestable lie), there’s going to be a mad dash for her bedroom and the misperceived safety that comes from cowering under numerous blankets. I know if she snatches a box of Hostess Ho-Hos off the shelf (Now With 40% more filling!) she’s going to turn on the waterworks when I make her put them back. But I was unprepared for the magnitude of her despair when she learned she couldn’t go to the Super Bowl.

I guess I shouldn’t have been as taken aback as I was. After all, we pass Raymond James Stadium every day on our way to school. She sees the giant billboards of muscular men in uniforms striking picturesque posses of athletic prowess. She’s seen the pirate flags flapping gallantly in the wind. She’s asked many questions about what happens there and if it involves unicorns or Dalmatians in any way. When I told her no to both I thought that would be the end of her curiosity, but she surprised me with a counter-observation.

“Girls can play football, too, you know Daddy.”

“Of course they can. Do you play football on the playground?”

“Yes, but the boys think they’re the only ones who can run fast. I can run fast!”

“Yes you can,” I said, thinking of her most recent dash from the medicine man.

“Do girls play football in the stadium?”

“Well,” I hedged, not wanting to limit her dreams of becoming the first female half-back while at the same time feeling compelled to temper unrealistic expectations of gridiron glory. “Let’s just say there are many women on the sidelines during the games and they get plenty of attention.” 

I hoped that would be the end of it. And for a while it was. But then we started to notice a buzz of activity around the stadium. Bleachers were being erected. Big white tents were springing up like giant mushroom. Trucks with concrete barricades and steel fences were pulling up every morning, making us wait until they swung past with their oversized loads.

  “What’s going on?” My daughter asked. “Are they going to sell cars again?”

  “Nope. It’s the Super Bowl, honey. They’re getting ready for the Super Bowl.”

  “What’s the Super Bowl?”

  “It’s like going to Disney World, only for football players,” I quipped. For a split-second I was happy in my oblivion, thinking I’d deftly explained the hype surrounding the event in terms a preschooler could understand. Then I heard her gasp and I knew, I KNEW, I’d made a big mistake.

  “I want to go to the Super Bowl!”

  Auugghhh! I wanted to pound my head against the steering wheel until I’d spelt out STUPID in big red welts across my forehead. Now I’d gone and done it.

  “Honey, it’s not really like Disney World. It’s just a bunch of football players running around smashing into each other. You wouldn’t like it.”

  “I like football! Can we go? Can we, Daddy?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?” She was already on the verge of tears. The white tents passed by on our right like a row of Cinderella Castles fashioned in fabric. Even I wanted to sneak over the fence for a peak.

  “Because lots and lots of people want to go and only a few people can get tickets.”

  “So get tickets. I want to go to the Super Bowl and watch the people smash into each other.”

  “I can’t get tickets.”

  “Why not?”

  I knew then that her tears were unavoidable. Might as well instill in my daughter her first taste of economic reality. “Because the tickets cost a lot of money and mommy and I aren’t rich.” There, I’d said it. The cold, harsh reality. But a valuable lesson, nevertheless. Now, maybe, she’d quit bugging me for that helicopter she claims everyone else in her class comes to school in.

  “But I want to go to the Super Bowl!” It takes exactly 11.543 minutes to reach her school after we’ve passed the stadium. I know because I timed it. Eleven-and-a-half minutes of my daughter sobbing inconsolably as she pleaded for her rightful place in the stands at a sporting even she had only the vaguest notion of. It seemed much, much longer.

  “Everybody’s going to the Super Bowl but me,” she sniffed as we got of out the car. Other parents were escorting their tykes inside. Some give my tearful daughter a sympathetic smile. One father asked why my usual “Little Miss Sunshine” was so down in the dumps.

  “She’s upset because she can’t go to the Super Bowl.”

  For a moment I thought I was going to have to deal with two weepers. The other father took a few seconds to regain his composure.

  “I know just how she feels,” he said and darted inside.

  Maybe when this is all over, all offer to take them both to Disney World. After all, that’s where the winning quarterback will be headed after the game.