Tarmac and a shot of Jack

1995. Peyton Manning at the helm. Final score: 41-14. Knoxville News-Sentinel headline the next day: "VOLS CRUSH BAMA".

Fifteen years of student-athletes wandering hallways that perpetually reconstruct themselves.

We watch WWF become WWE. We watch DTD lose its campus privileges. Victorian beauties give way to big block monstrosities full of modern conveniences.

Children grow up. Some die in random street violence. Others in hunting accidents while stalking deer or slaying enemies.

The song remains the same.

The visiting team making last-day game preparations while the faint noise of jets and props gun up and gear down.

A solitary crow on a carpark pole adjusts its feathers and launches confidently into the warm October air.

A Texas' boy's son and a backup launching missiles to find weaknesses in the opponents' defensive wall.

In the crowd, cheerleaders try to fire up the 13th man (never exactly sure if the coach(es) has/ve placed 10 or 12 on the field).

Fifteen years and the score flipflops, 10-41.

No excuses.

Sure, three years and three coaching systems give the upperclassmen sleeping fits.

But that ne'er promised rose garden sprouts up anyway, briery and prickly long afore appears the scenty blooms a winning gentleman gives his lady in a promising proposal.

The eternal seeds of hope hibernate.

Boys grow into players, coaches, cheerleaders, administrators, valets, band directors, baritone horn players and warriors.

We know the cycle's not always in our favour so we keep rolling the big ring along.

In that big picture we don't want to see, we all benefit.

A Star Trek fanatic, who wore Star Trek themed underwear to school, becomes a football fan because of his brother, yelling for the opponent in a stadium full of 102k+ mainly yelling for the hometown team.

Makes you wonder why a futuristic, peaceloving society is always going to battle stations. Maybe - TV/film ratings are not the same as a pure futurist's dreams.

Of course the future does not exist. That is, we play the game of life, to find out who's willing to give up life, liberty, limbs and roses for a cause bigger than one of us.

That's why I say thanks to Tiffini, the valet, room cleaners and gift shop operator at Airport Hilton; Michael at Pizza Hut; the hostess, server, cook and manager at Zachary's Steakhouse; Double J Whitetails of Alabama; Gigi's; the circle drill and Come Sail Away; Rocky Top Buses; Bridgeport Fire&Rescue, "We Care Enough To Wear Pink"; Charlotte, Jasmine and Damien at Old Time Pottery; those who give thanklessly.