In football season, here’s why she keeps aspirin and a blood pressure monitor handy
It was the loveliest of respites. For months, my home has been free of a whirling dervish of emotional turmoil, where a spouse’s mood can go from jubilant elation to anger and then dive into a pit of festering despair in a matter of minutes.
But alas, we’ve now arrived at the time of year when my husband loses his mind. The cause of this complete mental collapse that occurs every single Saturday in the fall is that I’m married to an alumnus of the University of Texas who’s a humongous UT football fan.
I, as a patient and concerned wife, have suffered through a lot of Texas football, but last week when UT played Alabama, I decided for my own mental health to not be in our house while the game was on. This is because for an entire year my husband has been obsessed with Texas’s 20 to 19 loss to Alabama last September.
I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that he could and did work that loss into a conversation on a daily basis for an e-n-t-i-r-e year. Even on Christmas, he popped off about it. I believe his exact quote was “Alabama got their Christmas gift early when the refs handed them the Texas game.”
Sigh.
All of the above is why I eagerly vacated my home 30 minutes before the 6 p.m. kickoff. I, of course, did my due diligence before I left. I instructed my husband to take a baby aspirin to ward off a heart attack. He doesn’t have a history of heart problems, but you never know what a dropped pass or, God forbid, an interception might do to him.
I also dug out a blood pressure monitor we had for some reason that now escapes me and placed it on the coffee table. I told him he might want to check his blood pressure every quarter just to be on the safe side. Again, my husband has no blood pressure issues but if he witnessed a couple of quarterback sacks I feared for his health.
After all that I blissfully got it in my car and met my son for some Mexican food. During the entire meal both of us had our phones out checking the score of the game. Texas was leading the first half, but when Alabama took the lead in the third quarter my son looked worried and said, “You probably need to go home and check on Dad.”
Ugh, he was right, so I ventured back home and witnessed a scene as soon as I pulled into our driveway. It was my husband aggressively taking down his UT flag.
When I asked him why, his response was, “Because they’re breaking my heart. That’s why.”
My next question was, “Umm, did you take that baby aspirin?”
Fortunately, in the fourth quarter Texas scored 21 points and went on to win the game. Unfortunately, my husband now sees me as his “lucky charm” since my arrival back at the house coincided with the Texas scoring bonanza.
What this means is that my presence is now required at every game. So, I guess I’m going to be stuck/held hostage on our basement couch every Saturday for the next three months witnessing my husband go through his emotional and spiritual Texas football journey/tantrum.
Honestly, just thinking about enduring this for the next 10 freaking Saturdays (not even counting if Texas makes it into the Big 12 Championship or a bowl game) is giving me chest pains. Now, I think I might need that baby aspirin.
Reach Sherry Kuehl at snarkyinthesuburbs@gmail.com, on Facebook at Snarky in the Suburbs, on Twitter at @snarkynsuburbs on Instagram @snarky.in.the.suburbs, and snarkyinthesuburbs.com.
