Joe Guidry is the deputy editorial page editor of The Tampa Tribune. He is a Tampa native and a graduate of the University of South Florida. He is married and has an adult son.

Jeff Stidham

Jeff Stidham grew up and lives in Bartow. He has been with the Tribune for nearly 22 years, the last 10 on the editorial board.

William Yelverton

William Yelverton is a Tribune editorial writer who has worked for the paper nearly 22 years. He lives in the Dade City area.

Jim Beamguard

Jim Beamguard is a Tribune editorial writer. He is a native of North Carolina and a graduate of Davidson College. He and his family live in Brandon.

Jackie Papandrew:

Jackie Papandrew is a freelance writer and editor. Her syndicated humor column appears in publications in the United States, Canada and India. She lives in Largo with her husband and children. Visit her website at www.jackiepapandrew.com.

Camille Beredjick

Camille Beredjick is a senior at Chamberlain High School, an avid musician and a scribbler with a quirky sense of humor. In the fall, she will be attending Northwestern University to study journalism, political science and music, and she plans to pursue a career in journalism.

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Jim Harnish is in his 17th year as Senior Pastor at Hyde Park United Methodist Church in Tampa. He and his wife, Marsha, have two daughters and two grandchildren. He is a graduate of Asbury Theological Seminary and received the honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from Bethune-Cookman University. He is the author of six books and numerous articles and studies. He enjoys playing with his grandchildren and cheering for the Florida Gators.

Angela Hunt

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Sheryl Young

Sheryl Young was a Tampa Tribune Community Columnist in 2005-2006. A freelance writer since 1997, including the Tampa Bay Business Journal, Tampa Style Magazines, St. Pete Times and nationally in Better Nutrition, Today’s Christian Woman and more. She’s received a First Place Amy Foundation national "Roaring Lambs" Writing Award, and has lived in Tampa Bay with her family for over 20 years.

Christie Gold

Christie Gold teaches English and journalism at Freedom High School in Tampa where she advises Revolution, the school newspaper. She has been both the Hillsborough County Teacher of the Year and Florida Journalism Teacher of the Year. She lives on a small farm in Wesley Chapel where she trains as a competitive equestrian.

Natalie D. Preston

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Interests include humor, politics, economics, community and world affairs, finance, people, religion, music, sports, current events, the arts and education.

Nicole Yunger Halpern

Nicole Yunger Halpern is an undergraduate at Dartmouth College, where she studies everything she can get her nerdy little hands on. Desired major: life. No, not necessarily biology. Life.

Kris DiGiovanni

Kris DiGiovanni is a Tribune Community Columnist, Huffington Post contributor, Daily Kos diarist, and teacher, who recently moved from NW Hillsborough to another planet - a small beach community in Pinellas County. She also blogs at www.sandscript.wordpress.com

H. David Braswell Jr.

H. David Braswell Jr. is an Information Systems Professional. He is a native New Yorker and a lifelong NY Giants fan. He attended college in California (Cal State Northridge) and moved to Tampa in 1998.

Sean Marcus

Sean Marcus teaches creative writing, journalism and reading at Chamberlain High School. He has one son and is expecting a daughter in early March. He can be reached at wuizabug@gmail.com

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The Power of Pigskin

Posted Sep 9, 2009 by Jackie Papandrew

Updated Sep 9, 2009 at 06:19 AM

I suppose it’s far too late to point out that I am definitely not ready for some football.

I doubt even Hank Jr. and all his rowdy friends could come over and make me appreciate the game. Yet here we are, once again in the season of beering and cheering, of touchdowns and testosterone. And I’m realizing how much the power of pigskin has shaped my life.

It started, as most psychologically traumatizing things do, in childhood. My father was gripped by a grave case of gridiron giddiness, and most of his mania was focused on the University of Oklahoma Sooners.

Game days were serious business around our house. By the time my dad’s friends arrived to catch the kickoff with their first brewski, the air was electric with excitement. If the Sooners did well, all would be right with the universe, and my papa and his pals would be bursting with pride.

If they did not do well, if they fumbled and failed, a deathly pall would hang over the house, and each man would have to find his own way to deal with his distress.

On the day of that granddaddy of all games for the diehard Sooner fan OU versus Texas my father and his mates would do a happy little dance around the room every time their team scored, and they’d sing a mockingly modified version of the Texas fight song that ended with a rather rude suggestion involving biting and backsides.

But if, by some terrible tragedy, the loathsome Longhorns won the game, there would be great weeping and gnashing of teeth, along with an increased consumption of beer to drown their Sooner sorrows.

One of my dad’s friends actually once punched a hole in the wall, unable to contain his outrage at the calamity that had befallen the team.

All over a silly game. I just didn’t get it.

Then I went to college (at OU, naturally) and there, on a bright August day, I met a handsome, seemingly normal man. We talked about everything under the sun literature, art, philosophy, our hopes and dreams.

But then came September, and I was shocked one Saturday to find this fellow that I’d fallen for screaming shirtless in a stadium, his face and body painted crimson for the team. If I was smart, I’d have run away as fast as I could. But I was in love, and we all know that love is as blind as, judging by fan reaction, a great number of football referees.

So I foolishly married the man, and in time, produced some miniature Madden men of my own.

Fast forward to today. I’m living in a house absolutely inundated by pigskin passion. We have football bed sheets, football posters on the walls, even football toilet seat covers. On Friday nights, we watch my skinny, high school son in constant danger of being turned into a football version of Flat Stanley by what look (to me, anyway) like giants on the opposing team trying to tackle him.

During this silliest of seasons, the televisions in our house broadcast a perpetual stream of games, interrupted only by endless rounds of neckless men in nice suits discussing those games and the gladiators who play them. Our living room carpet suffers from football-mouth disease, caused by a constant assault from nacho cheese, onion dip, beer and chips that fall from lips that have to stop eating and scream at the idiots who are letting the victory slip from their very large hands.

And it’s only going to get worse. The holidays will be hamstrung by this crazy sport. When our extended family gathers to give thanks, three generations of football fanatics will genuflect before the gridiron god. It’s enough to make me want to throw up. Or punch a hole in the wall. Or maybe I’ll grab some of my rowdy friends and go shopping.

http://www.jackiepapandrew.com

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