We sometimes lose track of just how difficult it is to be as
prompt and consistently crisp and clear as you are with your game reports. Yours of yesterday was as bracing as a sunny
November afternoon. We know your task is
especially tall when games are like the one on Saturday, with Alabama doing
what a team like Alabama should do to a badly overmatched opponent.
All of the various ideas for topics to address that we had
laying around the shop like so many air wrenches, you already described
quite eloquently: a celebration of the seniors, check; a recounting of the game
statistics, check; putting into context of the season just what this game
meant, check; calling out a senior that even we have never heard of who has now
proudly writ his name in crimson flame in the Alabama statistical record which
will never be taken from him, check; an analysis of the coaching job done not
just in this game and this season, but a sustained record of excellence that
requires the occasional moment to stop and observe and just say “oh, my”, check;
a quick look ahead at what the future might hold for the 2019 edition of the
Crimson Tide, check….
Given your hard work we find little else to say about that contest
or this season. Well done.
Instead, if the readership will indulge us, especially at
this time of the year, we’ll pause to be thankful. Down here in the land of brake dust and
grease pits we occasionally run into a slow afternoon where even though there’s
no real cause -- pretty weather, not a state holiday, not too far from payday
-- it’s just a slow day. Those days used
to make us really anxious and wonder whether scattering a few roofing nails an
intersection or two up the road might at least get us a few flat fixes, just to
pass the time, you understand.
Given a little more age, we have learned that sooner or
later the slow days will give way to some much busier days when there hardly
seems room for all the cars to fit on the lot and everyone needs four
plus an alignment. So, we have learned
to be a little more relaxed, to sit back in the chair, watch out the window as
the cars go whizzing by, and be careful to give thanks for what we have.
One of the things we are thankful for on the slow days is
this, whatever this is. We appreciate
the fact that we are part of the Alabama community. In a day when civil discourse on issues where
reasonable minds might differ too often quickly devolves into name-calling and
worse, we, like Lewis Grizzard, are happy to have something we can rally around
with confidence. We are thankful for
those who take a few minutes out of their very busy lives to join us here each
week. We have made life-long friends by
virtue of this blog for whom we are everlastingly thankful. Occasionally someone will take an extra
minute out to send us an email -- we are appreciative of that, even when it
starts with something like: “Hey, chucklehead, your pre-dementia is showing,
that play you were talking about was in the ’78 season, not ’79.”
We have already rambled on longer than we intended this week. Follow whatever traditions you hold to. Ours is to remind ourselves that the
blessings we have are not a product of what we have earned, but what we have
been given. We hope that you and your families are able to gather safely this
week. We hope you find a slow time to
stare out your equivalent of our plate glass and contemplate the things in your
life that you hold dear and make you truly happy. And if you need a starting point, go ahead
and put your allegiance to your team on that list. As the Commissioner has documented, Alabama
has enjoyed a sustained level of excellence the last several years that is the
envy of the college football world. But,
again with a nod to Mr. Grizzard, win or lose, always us.
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. Let’s beat them like they stole a cow.
Roll Tide.
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