Football Season

It's finally football season! I almost forgot what it was like.

Last year was my first year of Cal Football student as an alumna. While most graduates would probably look forward to having a real seat (i.e., not standing up in the Student Section), I thought ahead during my years as a student to save all of my Student Section wristbands. Consequently, I didn't spend a single game sitting in my Young Alumni season ticket seat (not a bad seat, either), and I instead snuck over to stand for 4+ hours on a wobbly bench in the midst of a sea of screaming and/or drunk fans.

As a freshman, an unfortunate series of events caused me to miss the small window in which to purchase season tickets. I made my way to a few games, but with really bad tickets and standing in a really bad seat. Sophomore year, I was much more prepared. I brought my computer to class and had purchased season tickets within 5 minutes of the site opening for purchase; just enough time to close my browser before my professor walked by my row of the auditorium. Since then, I've spent every game in the first 8ish rows of the stadium... close enough to actually see the faces of the players I had crushes on (or at least that I thought I had crushes on, until I saw their faces). I knew an impressive amount of information about Cal Football and college football in general. I also started a ritual with a friend of mine named Bryan who worked for Cal Football and spent the games on the sidelines, where I spammed him with text messages before the game started to tell him where I was standing, and made him wave goofily (that's a word.) at me to make me feel special.

Every home game last year, I snuck in to Memorial Stadium with my friend Brandon and pretended I was not a middle school teacher and instead that I was still a Cal student, and I enjoyed all 4 standing hours with the screaming drunk people. Except maybe during that last hour when my back started hurting. And when it was raining.). Incidentally, I loved it.

I wasn't looking forward to this year, at first. Memorial Stadium is under construction this year, so games are at AT&T Park. Jeff Tedford and I have had irreconcilable differences for quite some time. Less and less of my friends are still going to games. San Francisco is cold. And hard to get to. But my dad is in town this weekend, so we got tickets to the first Cal game of the season, against Fresno State. I can't say it was the best display of Cal Football I've ever seen -- nothing compared to the Cal Football of my college years -- but the fans, the band, the spirit, and the fact that we won renewed my enthusiasm for college football. (We even got a sideline wave from Bryan.)

I'm looking forward to the rest of the season...