It's officially on. Yes, the college football season is two weeks old, and my past two Saturdays have been spent in glorious football immersion. But the beginning of the NFL season is always a big day for me. I was raised on this.
My mom had Browns season tickets before she met my father, and I more childhood Sundays in a certain big, drafty, filthy football cathedral by the lake than I ever did in church.
My Cleveland Browns memories are a happy tangled jumble of sights and sounds (and, let's be honest, smells.) I remember my dad complaining that Paul McDonald had all the mobility of a fencepost. And I remember the way the hot dogs tasted, hot and damp out of the vendor's metal box. (Yes, the mustard was properly brown.)
There was a reassuring sameness at Browns games. My parents always clipped the rosters from the paper and stuck them to a piece of thin cardboard with clear tape, for a weatherproof program. We'd pass it back and forth with my grandfather, who had arranged it so his seat was right by ours by slipping some cash to a kid on one of those seat-improvement derby days and having him run straight to the seat he wanted.
We sat three or four rows up from the main walkway. Section 33. During TV timeouts or halftime, I'd watch all people go by. It was a parade of bad mustaches and mullets. Sateen union jackets and giveaway painter's caps. I'd look at the skyscrapers visible out the open end of the stadium and look at cars going by on the Shoreway and wonder how anyone could be doing something else while the Browns were playing.
I guess I didn't think very big-picture back then. I didn't look ahead on the schedule, or wonder how the Browns stacked up with the rest of the AFC Central or anything like that. I just wanted to go to the games and watch the Browns win.
And now, 20 years later, it's still all I really want on a fall Sunday. I love football season.
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