Being the daughter of a single dad, sports were integral to our relationship. They were always a part of our lives. When I was little, my dad ran a fantasy football league, and in the days before the internet, doing so was like a part-time job. I would sit there as he made magazine-like stats books for his league staring at the massive trophy, seemingly my size, in awe. I was convinced my dad was some hot-shot sports guy, I thought his league was real. All of my early memories revolve around my dad and sports, whether it be banging along to the marching band on my toy drum during halftime of the Huskies 2001 Rose Bowl, going to Mariners games with my dad and grandparents, bag full of dolls, not a moment spent watching the games, or our yearly trips to pre-season Seahawks games. I spent the 2004 NFC championship that led the Hawks to the Superbowl building a fort with my neighbor and forcing her to watch the game with me because my dad was there. Once he heard I chose to watch the game on my own, I got to go to my first regular season game. I could not have been more excited.
After my mom left when I was 11, sports, having always been so interwoven in our lives, became the glue that held us together. After the divorce, my dad had to give up the season tickets he had since the Kingdome days. His next birthday, I bought us the best seats I could, which you couldn't see the South end zone from, to the Hawks game against Arizona. The Hawks won 58-0, I got to see my first win, and it was the first normal thing my dad and I got to do in months. For the next several years, it became a tradition to get my dad tickets to some game for any holiday. We went to my first college football game, the last game at the old Husky stadium, and countless Mariners games together. Our new house was covered in sports memorabilia. His signed balls, framed newspapers from when Randy Johnson threw a no-hitter, When the M’s made it to the ALDS, when the Hawks made it to the Superbowl, and the headline and tickets from the no-hitter he went to. Our house was decorated as if it were a small sports museum, and I loved it, I was proud of it.
Things with my dad weren't always easy; I lived with my aunt and uncle for six months when I was 17, but no matter how mad I was at him, we watched every Seahawks game together that season. It was three hours every week where we didn't have issues, where we could be “Mad and Dad.” We would talk about the game like everything was normal between us and it gave me hope. When my mom left, there was nothing she and I could talk about with any normalcy, it's what ultimately ruined our relationship. My biggest fear was losing my dad too, but our ability to come together every week and be normal for a few hours, It reassured me that I wasn't going to.
Me being a Coug now and him being a Husky fan, we spend a lot of our time trash talking each other. When he saw me wearing a shirt from my sorority when the Huskies played Alabama this year, he locked me out of the room until I changed, and blamed their loss on my wearing a WSU shirt during kickoff. When WSU basketball beat UW, I didn't let him hear the end of it. During any given game, the poor man gets 10 calls from me wanting to talk about that amazing catch or that bad call. While in Vegas this October for his best friend's birthday, we spent the entire day at Top Golf watching UW finally beat Oregon, and WSU kill Stanford, I don't think we were on the strip once that day, and it was the best day of the trip. I even got him to bet on WSU which might have killed him a bit, he still won't wear anything WSU related except for his “Coug dad” shirt, but that's “only because it doesn't imply he is a Coug fan.”
My dad and I had our lives turned upside down when I was 11. He was suddenly the single father of an almost teenage daughter. Whether it be my mom going a bit off the rails in the years that followed, struggles with depression, or your normal teenage problems, we struggled at times. However, no matter how hard things would get, we could always take our mind off of it when our teams were playing. There are many reasons my favorite place is the ballpark and I refuse to work weekends during football season—love of the game, the ability sports has to build community, the guaranteed fun time that comes along with a Cougar football game to name a few, but most importantly, it's because of my dad. Sports are our thing. They bring us together, they are central to my favorite memories. With football season having just ended, and baseball season just over a month away, I'm counting down the days until we can be “Mad and Dad” again, complaining about the Mariners all season, but never giving up on them. Counting down the days when I can rub it in his face that I continued watching the game when he went to bed because the M’s were down 5-0 and got to see them come back to win it. Counting down the days until I am the happiest I can be, with my dad, watching a game. It's more than just a game to me, sports are my favorite memories, what has propelled my through the hardest times, they are a fundamental bond with the most important person in my life, my dad.
