Nothing But Love :: golf blogger

Road Trip

The temperature thing on Public Square on the news ticker and advertising sign on the Higbee Building flashed 52 degrees Saturday morning at just before 6:45, as I walked the dogs. I doubt that the homeless guy sleeping on the metal cover of the access to the underground steam pipes that supply steam to the buildings in the downtown area would have confirmed that reading, being an overly optimistic reading from his view on the ground; but the sun was coming up, and the sky was clearing. It was a pretty good day we chose to see a football game in Columbus.

My most excellent friend, DT, was waiting for me, as I was late, which was not out of the ordinary, at an exit just north of Columbus. I had never been to a big college football game, meaning by "big college" a place with a stadium that held over 100,000 screaming fanatics. Oh, don't get me wrong. I went to college football games, even earned money for the baseball team's trip to Florida by working at the concession stand making popcorn and hot dogs. But the school I attended back in the day had an enrollment of about 2200, none of whom were fanatics. The football field -- you see there, I used "field," not stadium -- had a couple sections of grandstands that could hold several hundred people, if they crammed together on the parallel strips of cold metal rising twenty rows above the field, which was owned by the local board of education. The baseball field, where I played with a championship team in the Spring, across the crumbling asphalt driveway in the village park, served as the parking lot for the football field.

So, we picked up our tickets at Matt's place, along with the student ID's we borrowed -- if anybody asked, DT's name was "Mel;" and getting his hair cut was admittedly a big mistake because he looked much, much younger and better with long hair and a little make-up.

I was not prepared for what I saw -- when I say I wasn't prepared, I mean to say that DT told me that I wasn't going to believe what I saw and that no description was going to be adequate and to just wait and see. I had been a season ticket holder and had seen the Cleveland Browns play in the old Municipal Stadium that held almost 86,000 screaming, maniacal Browns fans, but DT was right.

Ten minutes before game time, the stadium was a sea of roiling red -- it seemed like everyone was wearing red, or in the parlance of Ohio State football, "scarlet," except for those forming the white "O" at the other end of the stadium. And they were louder than anything I ever heard at a stadium before. DT said it was a lot louder down near the fieldbecause the noise was funneled down toward the playing field.

Before the game, it seemed like they were all outside the stadium -- with tens of thousands more -- celebrating, cooking, eating, watching cheerleaders get thrown 20 feet in the air, many forming a wide lane for the Ohio State Marching Band to march to Ohio Stadium from St. John Arena across the street.

But close to game time, 4 F-16's roaring a few hundred feet above our heads, all I could say was "Wow!" The football game was secondary to the experience of being there. I never believed television could do it justice -- even with the HDTV hype -- now I know it can never get remotely near the experience.

Wow!

Posted by Bill at November 12, 2007 11:00 PM