I don't even understand what Dan's trying to argue. What does it mean to appreciate this win as an individual? I think that's pretty much what happens any time you derive enjoyment from anything. I get parts of his column from today
Quote:
The dumbest people among us are clogging local sporting-goods stores looking for cheaply-made hats and shirts to validate their connection to victory, while the rest are content to revel in the kind of contentedness that comes with waking up knowing your team was the successful one.
This makes sense but may be a bit of projection on his part. I wouldn't say that all the people buying memorabilia are trying to "validate their connection to victory" but there is an argument to be made that the dumbest among us are doing this. I'm okay with not having to buy stuff to know that the Blackhawks are the best team in the NHL.
But then he goes and does this:
Quote:
Take note of this fleeting emotional oasis, appreciate it, and understand that this – right now — is the real payoff.
And this:
Quote:
Nothing replaces or approximates this — the unshared time when the feeling is all yours, not diffused over block after block of red sweaters, not beamed to every last outpost, not yet entirely commoditized, packaged and sold.
And this:
Quote:
Don’t let this brief time pass without really savoring it and banking it away somewhere. It’s far more important than whatever plastic baubles that will soon be gathering dust or clothing that will soon fade, and be relegated unwittingly over time to the back of a drawer.
He keeps referring to "it" and "this" as the individual joy you experience from knowing that your team won but never explains
what that feeling is. It just
is he says. A kind of kicking your feet up and thinking what exactly? I don't know because he doesn't say. And then he goes on to essentially throw away his entire premise:
Quote:
Allegiance to a pro sports team does allow for important social connection to a larger whole, both in the arena itself and beyond, across generations. That creation of community is real, and not to be diminished.
This wouldn't be so bad hadn't just spent the previous 12 paragraphs doing exactly that. And once he does that closes with the same cryptic message from before:
Quote:
Make sure you carve out just enough of this rare chance to make part of it always belong to you, alone.
So what are we supposed to take away from this column? That sports are communal but don't ever forget that one time you sat alone in your house and realized that one team is better than all the other teams? It reads like he was on the cusp of making a poetic statement about the nature of sports fandom but it comes off as clumsy and inscrutable. Maybe that's a result of the fact that the column was written in a matter of hours but if someone wants to help parse meaning out this for me, I would be grateful.
_________________
Seacrest wrote:
The menstrual cycle changes among Hassidic Jewish women was something as well.
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I'm out guys. Can't do this anymore.
