Time To Talk A Little Volunteer Magic

Anyone who's followed my blog for the past few years is very much aware that I am a passionate college football fan. One of those annoying ones who will watch any game, any time during the season and will re-watch particular favorites on the DVR the other nine months of the year. And anyone who knows me on any level is very well aware that my LOVE is reserved for only one team and that's the Tennessee Volunteers. I come by it naturally--Tennessee born and bred with practically every member of my family sporting orange and white. And when I was a wild child, doing theater up and down the eastern seaboard, I perfected my love of the Vols through two things--understanding the game of football in a way few women back then did, and bartending at a sports bar in Florida, where for one week every fall I was the most unpopular girl with the busiest bar in the Florida Keys. 

No matter how long I tended bar or where, I have never worn any colors but my own school's.Every bar owner who interviewed me for a job, I told two things. First, I will double your Saturday day shift business from August to April. (Like college hoops too--who doesn't?) And second, I will never wear any gear other than Volunteers gear. The last bar owner was skeptical, seeing as Ohio State is only a few minutes away. But after the first two weeks of football season, he bought in--just like all the others did.

Unfortunately, being a Vols fan hasn't been easy, especially over the last decade. After a series of epic and abysmal hiring decisions by the University of Tennessee AD, the Vols' two biggest rivalries have unprecedented losing streaks. We've lost nine in a row to Alabama, and eleven in a row to the Florida Gators. Not because those teams are always so vastly superior, in my opinion, but because of the miasma of depression and failure that seeped like Legionnaire's disease into the sanctum sanctorum known as Neyland Stadium. 

But suddenly things are different up on the Hill.

Any real football fan who isn't blinded by mindless team bias knows that Butch Jones has been building a monster on Rocky Top. And while some Vols fans and the sports media were hyping Tennessee last summer, I went on record with Ryan McGee at ESPN during a substitute gig hosting Paul Finebaum`that I thought the Vols would go 9-4, but a couple of lucky breaks could take them to 11-2.

Sometimes it sucks to be right.

But I also told Ryan that THIS year would be the Volunteers' coming out party. And man--it sure is starting to look that way. Seventeen starters return from a team that last year was too inexperienced to make certain those couple of balls bounced their way. That includes probably the strongest overall backfield in the SEC, a veteran defensive unit that's chomping at the bit under new Defensive Coordinator Bob Shoop, and the top special teams unit in the country in 2015. The schedule is favorable with both Florida and Alabama coming to Neyland, a major out of conference matchup with Virginia Tech slated for the 'neutral site' of Bristol Motor Speedway, just up the road from Knoxville. and the SEC East currently in coaching flux.

In the words of Rod Gilmore as Evan Berry sliced up Northwestern with a 100-yard interception return for a touchdown with 8 seconds to go in the Outback Bowl a few months ago: "2016 is going to be a good one for the Vols if it keeps rolling like this!"



Why thank you--yes it is rolling...rolling...rolling, and I don't mean the Tide.

I have a lot of friends. Many--okay, most--of them are football freaks like me. The cornerstone of our friendship is based on and around football. But there's a catch. While we all love our respective teams, we try to keep the fangurl blindness out of it. Do we backslid into 'my team is better than yours'? Of course we do. But we don't lose our minds over a little 'Alabama sucks' or "Vols choke again'. We can discuss each other's teams and players knowledgably and without prejudice. And I gotta tell you something--

The rest of the SEC is starting to take notice.

Don't believe me? If you've never met LSU Dad, you should. His videos are both insightful and hilarious. And this is what HE thinks:

Sports media makes fun of Butch Jones and his cliches, and I have to admit--I got a little tired of "brick by brick" and "analytics" and some of his other favorite sayings too. But it's funny--this year, Butch Jones doesn't seem to be as hung up on those cliches. It's like he used them to mask what was really going on behind the scenes, and now he knows that...well...he doesn't have to. Because he can't. Offseason moves so far have been huge. Keeping Alvin Kamara, Cam Sutton, and my hometown, same high school (Northeast Eagles in Clarksville!) favorite Jalen Maybin-Reeves was a HUGE win for UT--bigger than signing some of the new recruits, frankly. Hiring Bob Shoop was another massive power play.

But here's why things are different on the Hill.

Today is UT's graduation. We are literally sixteen weeks away from opening kickoff. Sixteen weeks and seven hours from now, the college football season will begin. I've been a Vols fan for longer than I will admit--birth, most likely--and I have to tell you: it's been painful to root for UT the past ten years or so. Literally PAINFUL. Even the past couple of years, when our way-too-young team started to close in on the season, the doubts would begin--not only for the fans, but the players. And why not? Eleven losses in a row to Florida. Nine losses in a row to Alabama. These teams are arguably our biggest rivals. And as those circled dates drew closer on the calendar every year, the same feeling began to churn in all our guts.

Dread.

But not this year.

This year, when Florida players started mouthing off--looking at you Jalen Tabor--no one was scared. No one was angry. Everyone was like--knock yourself out, pal. Jalen Hurd, our running back, summed it up best.

6'0. 190. Just talkin' for attention. Not going to end well buddy. 

Considering that he's a 6'4", 240 lb running back who delivers hits like this--

--perhaps Jalen Tabor should reconsider poking the beast with a pointy stick. Especially when that beast has fifty pounds on you and runs 19.1 MPH on an elevated treadmill and 23.1 mph on a flat one. I'm no physicist, but I'd be willing to bet that the Jalen vs Jalen collision will favor the big guy in smokey grays. 

Yes, I said smokey grays--and probably a Checker Neyland triumph as well. 

Senior captain Jalen Reeves-Maybin (again--MY hometown and high school)in his response to the Tabor brou-ha-ha displayed something else I really like. 

Reeves-Maybin said he prefers to let his play do the talking.“We’re not gonna feed into that,” Kamara said. “We’re not too thirsty for attention.”
“Just play the game,” Reeves-Maybin said. “Play the game. Let it speak (for itself). You don’t see great players out there saying stuff like that. Just play.”

As for Alabama, my friends who root for the Tide are a little uneasy about the Third Saturday in October--which this year actually IS on the Third Saturday in October. October 15th, in fact--the day before my milestone *mumblemumble* birthday. A group of Finebaum callers are renting a cabin in the Smokies for that weekend and all going to the game. I'm looking forward to meeting them in person as they've all become such dear friends of mine. And nothing would be a better birthday present than driving back to Gatlinburg in a car with five Alabama fans who just watched the Tide get beat in Neyland Stadium.

I'd be able to cross one thing off my bucket list. Happy birthday to me.

The great thing about college football is that you never know what's going to happen. Regardless, though, I'm starting to see a quiet confidence creeping up Rocky Top. Silly fans--the kind who always think their team is going to go undefeated--don't count. But the knowledgeable fans, the sports media, the coaching staff, and the players--they do. While the returning veterans, the favorable schedule, and the feeling that everything is in place cannot be discounted, the main difference I see between the Vols of 2016 and the Vols of the past decade is in the mindset.of the players. Not just the seniors, but the new guys as well. Ever hear of Jonathon Kongbo? 

You will. 

 Is Tennessee's struggle back to the top of the heap over at last? I don't know. Maybe. Sure is starting to feel like it. The important differential is, I think, that the players don't believe UT is back. They KNOW Tennessee is back. The traditions are back. The power is back. The joy is back. The confidence is back. And it's infectious.

I'm not going to predict a record for the season, or wins over the Vols' biggest rivals. I'm not going to predict All-Americans or Heismans or playoff spots. After all, we are talking about the SEC--anything can happen. But it's foolish for anyone to deny after watching the progress UT has made over the past three years that Butch Jones wasn't kidding when he said he was rebuilding the whole program. The Vols just posted their highest collective GPA in the history of the program. Players are matriculating. And some of our guys, like Josh Dobbs, find ways to make a difference in both small ways and big. All of these things are WINS. The Vols are just better all-around, both on the field and off. They're committed to their path--and that kind of commitment doesn't just show up one day out of the blue. Commitment comes with confidence.

Confidence leads to wins. And if the Vols are winning in the classroom, winning on graduation day, winning in the realm of life, then they have learned how to win on the field as well.

It's good to see Rocky Top with its swag back.

So I'm planning to go to several games--the Battle of Bristol, the Florida game (where I fully expect to see smoky grays and Neyland checkered), and Alabama. Planning to drop off some orange roses on the General's grave, and tailgate with all the Volunteers I know and love online. Probably will bring some gator fritters in September and wear my gator boots. In October I'll dig out 'the' sweatshirt--the one I've only worn to the Third Saturday in October games I've attended since I bought the shirt in 1999--'the' sweatshirt is undefeated in three games in Knoxville and two in Tuscaloosa. I may chuck a couple of things at Lane Kiffin if I get close enough. And I'll be certain to be there with signs that will show up on TV if either Gameday or SEC Nation does their pre-game show at Neyland on those days. But for now, Team 120 has inspired me to deliver a line I haven't delivered since Phillip Fulmer was the coach.

See you in Atlanta..And if UT quarterback and senior captain Josh Dobbs is right, see you in Tampa too.

Because THEY believe, they've made a believer out of me.

Yesterday, I Witnessed Something Extraordinary--Finebaum Family, Phyllis from Mulga, Tiny Tide, and Love

You may have noticed yesterday that I republished a post I did several months ago regarding a wonderful story about Bama fan and Finebaum caller Phyllis Perkins. 

That's the first time I've ever republished a blog post, and that happened for a reason. 

As you know, Phyllis's husband Don was diagnosed with inoperable and terminal stage 4 lung cancer some months ago, and this family, being of modest means, has been struggling financially. After I wrote that blog post, a trio of Finebaum callers (Rich Johnson, Johnny Lynn, and Fred Somers) started a GoFundMe campaign on Phyllis's behalf. What you may not know is that both Phyllis and Don were concerned about the cost of paying for his funeral.

Funeral costs are staggering these days--averaging between $8-10,000 in most places. The Perkins family, with both Phyllis and Don on Social Security, and already struggling under astronomical medical and daily living costs, would have been incapable of meeting those costs as they are already sinking further into debt. Medical debt is no joke, as I am well aware personally. Even if you're insured and/or on disability, there are some expenses that are just not covered. Even disability and Medicare only cover 80%, and the price of even the most conservative cancer treatment is just ridiculous. Add to that utility bills, food, house insurance, car insurance, etc. and you're looking at a family living at subsistence level. 

So Rich and Fred and Johnny started the GoFundMe campaign to give both Phyllis and Don some peace of mind. While Phyllis wouldn't ask for anything for herself, for Don--she would. A goal was set to raise enough money to cover the expenses of a funeral, and to take that worry at least off the shoulders of a dying man. The campaign began on November 20. Fred asked if they could link to my blog post--which was obviously a no-brainer--and we began to try to stir up interest on social media. Using fan sites--in particular Crimson Tide sites where Phyllis is somewhat of a legend--slowly we began to see money start to trickle in. By 8 pm on January 13, the campaign had made $4500. 

But then, something amazing happened. 

First off, Paul Finebaum told the story on his show Wednesday afternoon. You've heard me mention Finebaum before--a longtime Alabama journalist who now has an extremely popular (and unpopular) call-in show on the SEC Network. His relationship with Phyllis goes back years, to when his show was a local gig on AM radio and she used to call him up and bless him out for criticizing her beloved Coach Gene Stallings. About the same time, an article came out in the Birmingham paper. You can read it on their website:

http://www.al.com/news/birmingham/index.ssf/2016/01/hey_paul_phyllis_from_mulga_ge.html 

The article also referred to this blog. So obviously, being a writer with books close to release and a savvy blogger, I reissued the original blog post with updated links. And then Johnny, Fred, and I--Rich is out of town on a business trip--began to pelt social media throughout the afternoon with links, pleas, and updates. The Finebaum show social media was joined by the SEC Network as well as other media sites/personalities in generating a lot of Twitter traffic. Fred called in to the Finebaum show. Other callers and followers began to call/tweet with questions. Longtime Phyllis foe Danny Kanell donated a thousand dollars to the campaign And then--Phyllis called the show herself. 

By the time she called, her campaign had already increased to around $20,000--almost five times the amount it had raised the night before.  Her call was just amazing--amazing enough that I can't describe it. You guys just have to hear it. 

And after she called, a miracle happened. 

First, a wonderful couple donated $10,000 to the campaign. But hundreds of other people gave what they could, from SEC Network's beloved Marcus Spears' huge donation to a little kid that emptied his piggy bank and gave it all--eight dollars. The child actually added to that later when he found roll of pennies, bringing the total gift to $13. People from all walks of life gave what they could. Alabama fans were joined by fans from the SEC schools--all of them. Some folks donated on behalf of their schools not even in the SEC--like Red Raider Ed (Texas Tech) who donated a thousand dollars. And every gift, regardless of size, was a pledge of love for this tiny Alabama woman who had somehow touched their lives--not only because of the tragedy she was fighting through, but because of her unswerving, unquestioning love for college football and her Alabama Crimson Tide.

In the past few hours, I've watched the total ticker edge up over $45,000. Radio and sports personalities all over the country are calling for their listeners/followers/readers to help--like most recently Cole Cubelic, for example, just off the top of my head. Some fans, like Fred from Plano made videos in support, encouraging people to make videos and donate. 

This outpouring of kindness and generosity has not only restored my faith in humanity, but is going to make such an amazing difference to this family that has already dealt with so much. With Don so ill, he's constantly cold. The effort to keep him warm is resulting in utility bills over $450--a staggering blow to a couple on Social Security. This money doesn't mean new cars and clothes; it means survival, at its most basic level. But it also means peace. Peace for Don, who no longer has to worry how Phyllis will survive once he's gone, and peace for Phyllis, who can now concentrate her attention upon the man she loves who is slowly, incrementally leaving her behind. 

But at the center of the story, for me, stands Phyllis, who is no longer quite as alone as she thought. 

Last night I spoke with her on the phone, and amidst all the tears and laughter and overwhelming gratitude, she told me a story that encapsulates who she is down to the last detail.

Twenty years ago, she was in someone's home who raised exotic birds for sale. She went to the bathroom, and while in there heard a little whistle. She looked in the window and found a cage with a tiny, weak cockatiel in it. The cockatiel was deformed, rejected by its mother, and unsaleable. The owner had put the bird in a cage without food and water so it would die. 

Phyllis took that bird home. She bought vitamins and the top food. Patiently, she taught that bird how to eat--the mother had attacked the baby and destroyed part of its beak, so Phyllis had to coax food into its tummy seed by seed. One claw was deformed, and all the feathers on the undersides of the wings were gone. But Phyllis didn't give up. She lavished care on her little patient. She held it to her chest so it could hear her heartbeat and be soothed. And once the little guy grew strong enough to grip, she taught it to sit on her head while she went about her day. 

One day, she noticed that when the Andy Griffith show came on, the little bird--now named Tiny Tide--would whistle along with the theme song. So she decided to teach him how to whistle Yea Alabama! (Full disclosure: as a Volunteer, I'm not too fond of the song personally, but as a Tide fan she wouldn't have taught Tiny Tide how to whistle Rocky Top, now would she?)

Every night, Tiny Tide sat on her head and she would whistle bars of Yea Alabama! to him. And before long, he did it! He could whistle the tune. One night soon after, Coach Gene Stallings called to see how her son was doing. (Hear about that amazing relationship in my original post about Phyllis) Tiny Tide was sitting on her head, and during the conversation he started to whistle Yea Alabama! Coach Stallings stopped cold. 

"What was that?"

Phyllis told him the story.

"Do you mean to tell me that's a cockatiel whistling Yea Alabama?"

She confirmed it. 

"Can you videotape that? I'd like to see it."

So a few days later, they recorded Tiny Tide's Bama repertoire and sent the videotape to Coach Stallings. When he got the tape, he took it into the viewing room. All the coaches, players, athletic department staff, and even the president of the University were brought it to hear the story of the tiny, deformed cockatiel whose own mother had rejected it, whose owner had shut it away to die, whose life was saved by a redoubtable woman who would not give up on it. And the payoff?

"After everything that bird's been through, after everyone gave up on him, he can now sit on that woman's head and whistle Yea Alabama! And if that bird can do that, WHAT CAN YOU DO?"

Talk about a lesson in overcoming adversity. That seems to be the lesson Phyllis has for everyone--and it's a lesson few people are truly qualified to teach.

So you see, there's a reason why people have responded to Phyllis the way they have. There's something about a woman who, despite all the turmoil and challenges of her life, can inspire people like that. No matter what the odds are, she just won't give up...whether it's on a football team or a dying bird. Tiny Tide is now 23 or 24--still singing, still whistling Yea Alabama! and still clinging to his beloved owner's head like she taught him when he was an unwanted, unloved little bird marked for death. He now comforts her as she faces one of the darkest hours of her life. 

If you can help, please head over to Phyllis's GoFundMe page and give what you can. If you are one of the over 600 people who already have helped, bless you for your generosity. If you can't donate, then please spread the word to people you know. But more than anything, keep her and Don in your prayers and thoughts. 

Tiny Tide will thank you for it, and will sing. 

Re-Release of Phyllis from Mulga's Amazing Story With Her Crimson Tide. Gene Stallings, and her Troubled Son

Writer's note--this is a reissue of an earlier blog post about Finebaum super Fan Phyllis from Mulga and her incredible story about Coach Gene Stallings and the Alabama Crimson Tide. This post was featured in an article today which you can read at http://www.al.com/news/birmingham/index.ssf/2016/01/hey_paul_phyllis_from_mulga_ge.html. 

Right now, Phyllis needs our help. Her husband, Don, is suffering from Stage Four lung cancer and the Finebaum Family (led by super fans Rich from Atlanta, Johnny from Cullman, and Fred Somers) have created a GoFundMe campaign to help the family deal with soaring medical expenses. If this story resonates with you, consider contributing what you can at https://www.gofundme.com/RollTidePhyllis

Sometimes, the element that changes a casual fan into a fanatic is not straightforward. That element can be intangible, sometimes even unidentifiable. But I've found though years of associating with fans who live, breathe, eat, and die with their football teams that there's always a story, a single moment in time that takes a fan from just simply enjoying of the sport to a psychological and emotional involvement with their team that elevates the entire experience for them. Today's post is actually the original Song of the South, the story that inspired me to write this series, because it involves ordinary people who found a way to make their indirect association through Alabama football into something really extraordinary.

This Song of the South begins with a feisty little lady named Phyllis from Mulga, Alabama. If you follow the SEC or watch ESPN, you know who she is.

Phyllis is perhaps the most famous caller on the Paul Finebaum show which, as pretty much all of you know, is a daily devotion of mine. I set up my writing sessions so that I can have that four hour block off every weekday--mostly because there's no way I can write when Finebaum's going on in the background. Phyllis is a big part of why I am addicted to the show. She is a die hard Alabama fan, known mostly for her rants against self-satisfied sports media types like Colin Cowherd. Last year, she sneeringly referred to him as Colin Cow-turd, and apparently that really bothered him because he hasn't stopped talking about that yet.

When a caller to a radio/SEC Network show makes it onto SportsCenter because Colin Cow-turd is butt-hurt that Phyllis from Mulga called him a mean name, you know that caller has some serious chops.

To tell Phyllis's story--and I'll try to do it justice--we have to start at the beginning, and that's fifty-odd years ago. Phyllis's father was a huge Alabama fan, and brought up his five sons and daughter to be the same way. Her dad was in the military, and throughout all the moving the family remained devoted to the Crimson Tide. Phyllis's father died at the age of forty-four, when she was just seventeen. But until the end, he commanded his children to carry on his love for Bama--and they did. At his funeral, all the flowers were crimson and white, and all six kids continued to cheer for the Tide. So through the Bear Bryant years of the 1960's and 70's, Alabama football was an important facet of life. The family came together for games, and as the kids got married and had kids of their own, they passed that love on to the next generation.

In 1978, Phyllis had a son, Jesse*. Unfortunately, there were complications with the birth, and when he was born he suffered from oxygen deprivation. Jesse was rushed to ICU so they could get him breathing on his own. The trauma of his birth caused mild brain damage, which for Jesse manifested in a neurological condition called familial tremors on his right side. Familial tremors are similar to Parkinson's disease and cause a patient to shake, uncontrollably and sometimes rapidly. The condition can worsen through emotional stress, or when the patient is trying to perform motor skills that require precision--like eating with silverware, for example. Such a condition is trying, but for a child it carries a special kind of hell. With Phyllis's son, that hell began when he started school.

Kids can be nasty little critters, unfortunately, and Phyllis's son learned that when he started going to school. As the days went on, Jesse grew to hate school because the people in it were cruel to him. The other boys would bully him, sometimes right in front of teachers who did nothing to protect the child. For example, when Jesse was nine, he was sitting in his seat on the bus and the bullies grabbed him by the hair and dragged him back into the next seat. Then they ganged up on him, making fun of his shaking.

The little boy had no friends, no hope, no outlet. And while Phyllis and her husband tried everything they could think of to help their son, Jesse sank into a serious depression. During that time, Gene Stallings was hired as the head coach at Alabama. Stallings was one of Bear Bryant's famous "Junction Boys" when he was the coach at Texas A&M, and had worked for the Bear as a defensive assistant coach for both the 1961 and 1964 national championship teams. So Stallings was familiar to Phyllis and her family, as he was to most of the Crimson Tide faithful.

One day, Jesse carried his lunch tray to the table where he sat, alone, every day. As he was opening his milk, his right hand began to tremble and he spilled his milk. So while he was trying to control the tremors so he could drink his milk, a table full of boys came over to make fun of him. One of the little monsters jumped up on the table and shouted, "Hey everybody! Come over here and watch Jesse make a milkshake!"

When Jesse got home, he was crying his eyes out. Phyllis sat him at the table trying to soothe her sobbing son. "What's wrong, Jesse?"

"Mom, I want to die."

Hearing a child say such a thing is the kind of thing that freezes a mother's heart. Phyllis instantly exclaimed,"Don't you say that! Don't you ever say a thing like that!"

"But I do, Mom. If life is going to be like this, I don't want to live it," the boy cried, and then he told his mother what had happened in the cafeteria.

That was the final blow. Phyllis and her husband knew their son was in trouble. They took him to the doctor, who immediately sent the entire family for therapy. Jesse needed help, not only learning to cope with his disability but also the crushing depression that was the natural after-effect of the bullying he endured at school. Their therapist recommended that they enroll their son in a school where he could receive full-time therapy, and they did. Jesse could only come home on the weekends, and they tried to make those visits home special. For this family, that naturally involved Alabama football. Every Saturday, the family would allow the familiar rhythms and excitement of football to draw Jesse back into the family fold. It was now 1992, when Alabama won the national championship, and Jesse's love for Tide football grew into a serious hero worship of Coach Stallings--like many of the boys his age in Alabama did that fall.

Jesse remained away at school for a year. When he returned home, he was coping better with his disability physically. But when he returned to school, the bullying started again. Phyllis was forced to watch as her son's depression intensified, and desperately tried to think of something--anything--to help Jesse get better.

So one day in March of 1993, she picked up the phone and called the athletic department at the University of Alabama. When she said she wanted to speak to Coach Stallings, they put her through to his secretary. Phyllis asked if it would be possible to send Jesse a signed picture of the coach. "My son needs a hero," she explained.

The secretary replied, "I will take this to Coach Stallings personally. I'll be praying for y'all." Phyllis hung up the phone and that was that. She had no way of knowing when--or if--the coach would grant her request.

Three days later, a poster tube arrived in the mail. The autographed poster was of Coach Stallings standing in the middle of the football field. Jesse was delighted with the poster. The autograph read: Jesse, thank you for being my friend--Gene Stallings.

A lot of stories like Phyllis's would end here. But not hers. This is where the story grows, entwining this woman desperate to help her troubled son with the Alabama head football coach--and, as any SEC fan knows, the head football coach of the Crimson Tide is actually the most powerful man in the state as long as he holds that job. Phyllis and Jesse were blessed, really, that Gene Stallings was that man. For Stallings, father of a son with Down's Syndrome, understood what mother and son were going through. And for him, a simple poster just wasn't enough.

A few days later, the coach's secretary called Phyllis back. Stallings wanted to meet Jesse. So Phyllis, along with her excited son, older daughter, and two of her grandchildren, drove from Mulga, a little town outside Birmingham, to the University of Alabama football office in Tuscaloosa. They waited in the office with the secretary. "All of a sudden, the door opened and the biggest man I've ever seen in my life was standing there. He was so tall I thought he'd hit his head on the top of the door. My mouth fell open and so did Jesse's."

Before anyone could say a word, Jesse bolted across the room and hugged Coach Stallings around the legs. He looked up at this tall, kind-looking man and blurted, "Coach, do you really want to be my friend?"

Coach Stallings looked down at the boy and said gently, "What are you talking about, Jesse? I already am your friend."

Stallings sat down with the entire family, "He sat there and talked about football and talked to Jesse like he was grown up," Phyllis told me. "I could see right then a relationship was born. We were there for over an hour. He'd brought Johnny, his son with Down's Syndrome, to meet all of us and he was the most precious person I’ve ever met. After we went home, I saw the lights go off in Jesse’s eyes."

"Mama, I want to be the kind of man Coach is. He's a good man," Jesse said.

"Yes, son, he is. But you're special too."

"Why?"

"Because you are who you are, I got to meet my hero today too," Phyllis told her son. "Because he wanted to meet you."

That spring day in 1993 was the beginning of a relationship between the big, kindhearted football coach and Jesse. "In my closet, there's a big gold envelope," Phyllis said. "In that envelope are fifty-seven letters that Coach Stallings sent to Jesse. They're not lengthy. Sometimes it was simple, like  Jesse, I was just thinking of you today. You keep your chin up and make today a good day! And Jesse would write him back, and Coach would answer every letter."

When Jesse went back to school, he told some of his tormentors that he'd met Coach Stallings, but none of them believed him. So in one of his letters, he asked the coach what he should do about the bullying. Stallings responded by sending another package. One of the pictures they'd taken the day Jesse and Coach Stallings met was blown up poster-size, and with it Stallings had written: Jesse,  I want you to take this to school and show them that they are wrong. I am your friend and this proves it.

He also sent him a copy of the newspaper article after Alabama had won the national championship. There were seven pictures in the paper--pictures of the entire football team. And every player on that team had autographed the paper for Jesse.  Here’s something to take to school!  Stallings wrote.

Jesse took the poster and newspaper to school, and all of a sudden his entire life changed. Now the other kids wanted to know him because--wonder of wonders!--Jesse knew the head football coach at the University of Alabama! They were friends!

And from that point on, they left him alone.

"Because of Coach, Jesse got through to those kids at school that were bullying him. They turned around on a dime. They never bullied him again," Phyllis said, and I could hear the smile in her voice through the phone. "Jesse would tell them, 'Coach don’t care if I shake.' And the kids said, 'We’re sorry. We shouldn’t have done that.'

"Even one of the teachers who'd stood by and let those boys bully my son said, 'I saw those posters. I saw that newspaper. Chris is a mighty special child for Coach Stallings to do this.'

"'He’s not just special, he’s important,' I told her."

And once the story is put into its proper historical perspective, Stallings's actions become even more amazing.

"He had the defending national championship football team about to start spring ball, but he found the time to take Jesse in his arms," Phyllis said, her voice breaking. "Coach Stallings gave my son self-esteem...self-worth. Jesse followed his example. Coach told him not to get into drinking, not to do drugs. 'You can become somebody,' he told him. 'I'm depending on you to be a good son, like you've always been.' Now Jesse's a happy young men. I owe all that to Coach Stallings. He wasn't just a coach. He was a lifesaver. My husband and I were lost; brokenhearted. We didn't know what to do. Coach stepped in and gave my son a hero when he needed one the most."

Not every child with difficulties like the ones Jesse faced has a happy ending. Coach Stallings's own son, John Mark, died of a congenital heart defect in 2008. The coach chronicled his relationship with Johnny in a book he co-wrote with Sally Cook entitled Another Season: A Coach's Story of Raising An Exceptional Son. (Which is, by the way, an amazing read. I highly recommend it.) Every time Phyllis took Jesse down to Tuscaloosa, Coach Stallings would bring Johnny to meet them. "Coach‘s son was important to us. When you got hugged by Johnny, you got hugged. When he walked into a room, it all just got mellow. I was so proud that Coach Stallings got him to come each time we were there. That was one of the most blessed things—that we got to meet him too.

"When Johnny died it just broke our hearts. I couldn’t even stand the thought of how Coach Stallings and his wife felt. I couldn’t fathom it. When I talked to Coach again I broke down telling him I was so sorry. He said, 'The Lord has plans for all of us. Johnny wasn’t supposed to live til ten, but he showed them. He had a good life.' But I could tell his heart was torn into pieces."

One common theme I've found while listening to these Saturday Songs is how these teams, these schools and the people who love them find ways to do extraordinary things. Gene Stallings is an honored and highly respected man who has done great things throughout his life. On the University of Alabama campus is The Stallings Center, which is the home of the RISE school and its program designed to help children with disabilities from birth to age 5. The Stallings Center, established in 1994, now serves as a model for similar programs across the nation--partially funded by the golf tournament Coach Stallings hosts annually. And the playground at the center is named after his son.

But that's a big thing, something that in and of itself demonstrates palpably the positive influence Gene Stallings has. What makes Phyllis's story so poignant, so important, is the fact that while a bundle of fifty-odd letters, a few meetings, and some signed pictures might not seem like a big thing to the rest of us, for Jesse it was a monumental thing--an important thing. For Jesse, meeting Gene Stallings opened the door for a miracle--and that's an impact that cannot be quantified or dismissed. That miracle kept Jesse from becoming a statistic, it taught him how to find and make friends, and showed him that you can stand up to bullies and walk away the better man. That miracle has resulted in the continuing relationship between Stallings and Phyllis's family even today. "I talked to Coach Thursday before last. First thing he said was, 'How’s Jesse? You tell him I think of him all the time.' When I told Jesse, it just made his day. How can you be a better man than that?"

When people hear Phyllis explode on the Paul Finebaum Show, they probably don't give too much thought about why she loves the Alabama Crimson Tide as much as she does. She's not the kind of fan who can dissect football down to the X's and O's, or who can debate whether a dual option quarterback is better or worse than a traditional pocket passer. In fact, I've intervened online when some truly ignorant cretin is rolling out some horrible comment about Phyllis on Twitter. (Yes, I know...don't feed the trolls. I just can't stop myself...) Phyllis is a bigger person than I am. She doesn't care what anyone says about her. All she cares about is that Bama wins, and the bigger the better. And woe betide--yes, the pun is intentional--the poor schmuck (famous or not) who disses her football team or its coach. In fact, her long-running on-air relationship with Paul Finebaum began when he was making Finebaum-esque comments about Stallings on his show, and she started calling to ''straighten him out."

"I’ve always been fiery for the Tide," Phyllis said. "A lot of people think it’s me cheering for the team. But it’s about what the University of Alabama gave to me, without even knowing that they did. Coach Stallings and Alabama football are what caused all that to happen. When Coach helped Jesse, he helped me. When he helped my son, my spirits lifted and I was a much better person for it."

So even though I bleed Tennessee orange and white, I have to admit--Phyllis's story has given me a small warm fuzzy spot for Alabama. But only for 51 weeks a year, and never during the seven days that include the third (or fourth) Saturday in October when we annually play.

But for Coach Gene Stallings, who took the time to help a young boy find his way out of a dark labyrinth of torture and teach him how to grow up into a happy, well-adjusted young man who is the absolute pride of his mother's life...well, that warm fuzzy is now huge, and limitless. Because of the love Gene Stallings bore for his own son with special needs, he was uniquely qualified to share that love with another youngster who desperately needed a hero. Stallings became that hero not only for his own son, but for Phyllis's son and for Phyllis as well.

Phyllis is right. How could anyone be a better man than that? Perhaps--just perhaps, Gene Stallings is a hero for all of us.

Roll Tide.

*The name of Phyllis's son has been changed at her request. So because  I was so moved by his story, I substituted the name of my year-old grandson, who also had a rough start to life.

Songs of the South: Famous Finebaum Caller and Alabama Fan Phyllis from Mulga's Touching Story About Bama Football, Gene Stallings, and How They Saved Her Son

Sometimes, the element that changes a casual fan into a fanatic is not straightforward. That element can be intangible, sometimes even unidentifiable. But I've found though years of associating with fans who live, breathe, eat, and die with their football teams that there's always a story, a single moment in time that takes a fan from just simply enjoying of the sport to a psychological and emotional involvement with their team that elevates the entire experience for them. Today's post is actually the original Song of the South, the story that inspired me to write this series, because it involves ordinary people who found a way to make their indirect association through Alabama football into something really extraordinary. 

This Song of the South begins with a feisty little lady named Phyllis from Mulga, Alabama. If you follow the SEC or watch ESPN, you know who she is.

Phyllis is perhaps the most famous caller on the Paul Finebaum show which, as pretty much all of you know, is a daily devotion of mine. I set up my writing sessions so that I can have that four hour block off every weekday--mostly because there's no way I can write when Finebaum's going on in the background. Phyllis is a big part of why I am addicted to the show. She is a die hard Alabama fan, known mostly for her rants against self-satisfied sports media types like Colin Cowherd. Last year, she sneeringly referred to him as Colin Cow-turd, and apparently that really bothered him because he hasn't stopped talking about that yet. 

When a caller to a radio/SEC Network show makes it onto SportsCenter because Colin Cow-turd is butt-hurt that Phyllis from Mulga called him a mean name, you know that caller has some serious chops. 

To tell Phyllis's story--and I'll try to do it justice--we have to start at the beginning, and that's fifty-odd years ago. Phyllis's father was a huge Alabama fan, and brought up his five sons and daughter to be the same way. Her dad was in the military, and throughout all the moving the family remained devoted to the Crimson Tide. Phyllis's father died at the age of forty-four, when she was just seventeen. But until the end, he commanded his children to carry on his love for Bama--and they did. At his funeral, all the flowers were crimson and white, and all six kids continued to cheer for the Tide. So through the Bear Bryant years of the 1960's and 70's, Alabama football was an important facet of life. The family came together for games, and as the kids got married and had kids of their own, they passed that love on to the next generation. 

In 1978, Phyllis had a son, Jesse*. Unfortunately, there were complications with the birth, and when he was born he suffered from oxygen deprivation. Jesse was rushed to ICU so they could get him breathing on his own. The trauma of his birth caused mild brain damage, which for Jesse manifested in a neurological condition called familial tremors on his right side. Familial tremors are similar to Parkinson's disease and cause a patient to shake, uncontrollably and sometimes rapidly. The condition can worsen through emotional stress, or when the patient is trying to perform motor skills that require precision--like eating with silverware, for example. Such a condition is trying, but for a child it carries a special kind of hell. With Phyllis's son, that hell began when he started school. 

Kids can be nasty little critters, unfortunately, and Phyllis's son learned that when he started going to school. As the days went on, Jesse grew to hate school because the people in it were cruel to him. The other boys would bully him, sometimes right in front of teachers who did nothing to protect the child. For example, when Jesse was nine, he was sitting in his seat on the bus and the bullies grabbed him by the hair and dragged him back into the next seat. Then they ganged up on him, making fun of his shaking. 

The little boy had no friends, no hope, no outlet. And while Phyllis and her husband tried everything they could think of to help their son, Jesse sank into a serious depression. During that time, Gene Stallings was hired as the head coach at Alabama. Stallings was one of Bear Bryant's famous "Junction Boys" when he was the coach at Texas A&M, and had worked for the Bear as a defensive assistant coach for both the 1961 and 1964 national championship teams. So Stallings was familiar to Phyllis and her family, as he was to most of the Crimson Tide faithful.

One day, Jesse carried his lunch tray to the table where he sat, alone, every day. As he was opening his milk, his right hand began to tremble and he spilled his milk. So while he was trying to control the tremors so he could drink his milk, a table full of boys came over to make fun of him. One of the little monsters jumped up on the table and shouted, "Hey everybody! Come over here and watch Jesse make a milkshake!"

When Jesse got home, he was crying his eyes out. Phyllis sat him at the table trying to soothe her sobbing son. "What's wrong, Jesse?"

"Mom, I want to die."

Hearing a child say such a thing is the kind of thing that freezes a mother's heart. Phyllis instantly exclaimed,"Don't you say that! Don't you ever say a thing like that!"

"But I do, Mom. If life is going to be like this, I don't want to live it," the boy cried, and then he told his mother what had happened in the cafeteria. 

That was the final blow. Phyllis and her husband knew their son was in trouble. They took him to the doctor, who immediately sent the entire family for therapy. Jesse needed help, not only learning to cope with his disability but also the crushing depression that was the natural after-effect of the bullying he endured at school. Their therapist recommended that they enroll their son in a school where he could receive full-time therapy, and they did. Jesse could only come home on the weekends, and they tried to make those visits home special. For this family, that naturally involved Alabama football. Every Saturday, the family would allow the familiar rhythms and excitement of football to draw Jesse back into the family fold. It was now 1992, when Alabama won the national championship, and Jesse's love for Tide football grew into a serious hero worship of Coach Stallings--like many of the boys his age in Alabama did that fall.

Jesse remained away at school for a year. When he returned home, he was coping better with his disability physically. But when he returned to school, the bullying started again. Phyllis was forced to watch as her son's depression intensified, and desperately tried to think of something--anything--to help Jesse get better. 

So one day in March of 1993, she picked up the phone and called the athletic department at the University of Alabama. When she said she wanted to speak to Coach Stallings, they put her through to his secretary. Phyllis asked if it would be possible to send Jesse a signed picture of the coach. "My son needs a hero," she explained. 

The secretary replied, "I will take this to Coach Stallings personally. I'll be praying for y'all." Phyllis hung up the phone and that was that. She had no way of knowing when--or if--the coach would grant her request. 

Three days later, a poster tube arrived in the mail. The autographed poster was of Coach Stallings standing in the middle of the football field. Jesse was delighted with the poster. The autograph read: Jesse, thank you for being my friend--Gene Stallings. 

A lot of stories like Phyllis's would end here. But not hers. This is where the story grows, entwining this woman desperate to help her troubled son with the Alabama head football coach--and, as any SEC fan knows, the head football coach of the Crimson Tide is actually the most powerful man in the state as long as he holds that job. Phyllis and Jesse were blessed, really, that Gene Stallings was that man. For Stallings, father of a son with Down's Syndrome, understood what mother and son were going through. And for him, a simple poster just wasn't enough. 

A few days later, the coach's secretary called Phyllis back. Stallings wanted to meet Jesse. So Phyllis, along with her excited son, older daughter, and two of her grandchildren, drove from Mulga, a little town outside Birmingham, to the University of Alabama football office in Tuscaloosa. They waited in the office with the secretary. "All of a sudden, the door opened and the biggest man I've ever seen in my life was standing there. He was so tall I thought he'd hit his head on the top of the door. My mouth fell open and so did Jesse's."

Before anyone could say a word, Jesse bolted across the room and hugged Coach Stallings around the legs. He looked up at this tall, kind-looking man and blurted, "Coach, do you really want to be my friend?"

Coach Stallings looked down at the boy and said gently, "What are you talking about, Jesse? I already am your friend."

Stallings sat down with the entire family, "He sat there and talked about football and talked to Jesse like he was grown up," Phyllis told me. "I could see right then a relationship was born. We were there for over an hour. He'd brought Johnny, his son with Down's Syndrome, to meet all of us and he was the most precious person I’ve ever met. After we went home, I saw the lights go off in Jesse’s eyes." 

"Mama, I want to be the kind of man Coach is. He's a good man," Jesse said. 

"Yes, son, he is. But you're special too."

"Why?"

"Because you are who you are, I got to meet my hero today too," Phyllis told her son. "Because he wanted to meet you."

That spring day in 1993 was the beginning of a relationship between the big, kindhearted football coach and Jesse. "In my closet, there's a big gold envelope," Phyllis said. "In that envelope are fifty-seven letters that Coach Stallings sent to Jesse. They're not lengthy. Sometimes it was simple, like  Jesse, I was just thinking of you today. You keep your chin up and make today a good day! And Jesse would write him back, and Coach would answer every letter."

When Jesse went back to school, he told some of his tormentors that he'd met Coach Stallings, but none of them believed him. So in one of his letters, he asked the coach what he should do about the bullying. Stallings responded by sending another package. One of the pictures they'd taken the day Jesse and Coach Stallings met was blown up poster-size, and with it Stallings had written: Jesse,  I want you to take this to school and show them that they are wrong. I am your friend and this proves it. 

He also sent him a copy of the newspaper article after Alabama had won the national championship. There were seven pictures in the paper--pictures of the entire football team. And every player on that team had autographed the paper for Jesse.  Here’s something to take to school!  Stallings wrote. 

Jesse took the poster and newspaper to school, and all of a sudden his entire life changed. Now the other kids wanted to know him because--wonder of wonders!--Jesse knew the head football coach at the University of Alabama! They were friends! 

And from that point on, they left him alone.

"Because of Coach, Jesse got through to those kids at school that were bullying him. They turned around on a dime. They never bullied him again," Phyllis said, and I could hear the smile in her voice through the phone. "Jesse would tell them, 'Coach don’t care if I shake.' And the kids said, 'We’re sorry. We shouldn’t have done that.'

"Even one of the teachers who'd stood by and let those boys bully my son said, 'I saw those posters. I saw that newspaper. Chris is a mighty special child for Coach Stallings to do this.'

"'He’s not just special, he’s important,' I told her."

And once the story is put into its proper historical perspective, Stallings's actions become even more amazing.

"He had the defending national championship football team about to start spring ball, but he found the time to take Jesse in his arms," Phyllis said, her voice breaking. "Coach Stallings gave my son self-esteem...self-worth. Jesse followed his example. Coach told him not to get into drinking, not to do drugs. 'You can become somebody,' he told him. 'I'm depending on you to be a good son, like you've always been.' Now Jesse's a happy young men. I owe all that to Coach Stallings. He wasn't just a coach. He was a lifesaver. My husband and I were lost; brokenhearted. We didn't know what to do. Coach stepped in and gave my son a hero when he needed one the most."

Not every child with difficulties like the ones Jesse faced has a happy ending. Coach Stallings's own son, John Mark, died of a congenital heart defect in 2008. The coach chronicled his relationship with Johnny in a book he co-wrote with Sally Cook entitled Another Season: A Coach's Story of Raising An Exceptional Son. (Which is, by the way, an amazing read. I highly recommend it.) Every time Phyllis took Jesse down to Tuscaloosa, Coach Stallings would bring Johnny to meet them. "Coach‘s son was important to us. When you got hugged by Johnny, you got hugged. When he walked into a room, it all just got mellow. I was so proud that Coach Stallings got him to come each time we were there. That was one of the most blessed things—that we got to meet him too.

"When Johnny died it just broke our hearts. I couldn’t even stand the thought of how Coach Stallings and his wife felt. I couldn’t fathom it. When I talked to Coach again I broke down telling him I was so sorry. He said, 'The Lord has plans for all of us. Johnny wasn’t supposed to live til ten, but he showed them. He had a good life.' But I could tell his heart was torn into pieces." 

One common theme I've found while listening to these Saturday Songs is how these teams, these schools and the people who love them find ways to do extraordinary things. Gene Stallings is an honored and highly respected man who has done great things throughout his life. On the University of Alabama campus is The Stallings Center, which is the home of the RISE school and its program designed to help children with disabilities from birth to age 5. The Stallings Center, established in 1994, now serves as a model for similar programs across the nation--partially funded by the golf tournament Coach Stallings hosts annually. And the playground at the center is named after his son.

But that's a big thing, something that in and of itself demonstrates palpably the positive influence Gene Stallings has. What makes Phyllis's story so poignant, so important, is the fact that while a bundle of fifty-odd letters, a few meetings, and some signed pictures might not seem like a big thing to the rest of us, for Jesse it was a monumental thing--an important thing. For Jesse, meeting Gene Stallings opened the door for a miracle--and that's an impact that cannot be quantified or dismissed. That miracle kept Jesse from becoming a statistic, it taught him how to find and make friends, and showed him that you can stand up to bullies and walk away the better man. That miracle has resulted in the continuing relationship between Stallings and Phyllis's family even today. "I talked to Coach Thursday before last. First thing he said was, 'How’s Jesse? You tell him I think of him all the time.' When I told Jesse, it just made his day. How can you be a better man than that?" 

When people hear Phyllis explode on the Paul Finebaum Show, they probably don't give too much thought about why she loves the Alabama Crimson Tide as much as she does. She's not the kind of fan who can dissect football down to the X's and O's, or who can debate whether a dual option quarterback is better or worse than a traditional pocket passer. In fact, I've intervened online when some truly ignorant cretin is rolling out some horrible comment about Phyllis on Twitter. (Yes, I know...don't feed the trolls. I just can't stop myself...) Phyllis is a bigger person than I am. She doesn't care what anyone says about her. All she cares about is that Bama wins, and the bigger the better. And woe betide--yes, the pun is intentional--the poor schmuck (famous or not) who disses her football team or its coach. In fact, her long-running on-air relationship with Paul Finebaum began when he was making Finebaum-esque comments about Stallings on his show, and she started calling to ''straighten him out."

"I’ve always been fiery for the Tide," Phyllis said. "A lot of people think it’s me cheering for the team. But it’s about what the University of Alabama gave to me, without even knowing that they did. Coach Stallings and Alabama football are what caused all that to happen. When Coach helped Jesse, he helped me. When he helped my son, my spirits lifted and I was a much better person for it."

So even though I bleed Tennessee orange and white, I have to admit--Phyllis's story has given me a small warm fuzzy spot for Alabama. But only for 51 weeks a year, and never during the seven days that include the third (or fourth) Saturday in October when we annually play. 

But for Coach Gene Stallings, who took the time to help a young boy find his way out of a dark labyrinth of torture and teach him how to grow up into a happy, well-adjusted young man who is the absolute pride of his mother's life...well, that warm fuzzy is now huge, and limitless. Because of the love Gene Stallings bore for his own son with special needs, he was uniquely qualified to share that love with another youngster who desperately needed a hero. Stallings became that hero not only for his own son, but for Phyllis's son and for Phyllis as well. 

Phyllis is right. How could anyone be a better man than that? Perhaps--just perhaps, Gene Stallings is a hero for all of us.

Roll Tide. 

*The name of Phyllis's son has been changed at her request. So because  I was so moved by his story, I substituted the name of my year-old grandson, who also had a rough start to life. 

More Saturday Songs of the South are coming--the tales of how regular college football fans fell in love with their schools. You can check out my own Song of the South here. If you have a Song of the South you want to share, email me at kaantira(at)gmail.com with your own story, and I may tell yours in a future post.

For more information about Coach Gene Stallings, you can check out his official website.

To make an online donation to The Stallings Center RISE program, head over to their site. And if you can, please donate. Let's pay it forward in the name of this amazing man and his extraordinary capacity for love. 

Seasonal Song of the South: SEC Football and its Fans

So, I've been thinking...

Whenever I started out with those four words in a business meeting, all the other directors and senior staff members would groan and try to hide. Hard to do that in an online meeting, though, so they always had to suffer through it. 

So, I've been thinking...about following up on the FAN vs FANATIC post of a few days ago. 

Growing up in the deep South as I did, the beginning of football season kicks off a string of highly looked-forward-to events that seem to escalate the rate of time. For me it goes like this*: 

Football season starts-UT's first game-Labor Day-UT-Oklahoma game-the Florida game-trip to Neyland Stadium to watch the UT-Arkansas game-leaves change colors-UT/GA game-my birthday-my granddaughter Rori's birthday-my husband's birthday-Alabama week-Halloween (UT/UK game in Lexington. May hit that too)-sweater weather-countdown to championship week-Christmas shopping-Thanksgiving-Army/Navy game-Vandy beatdown-SEC Championship-put up the tree-Christmas-New Year's-bowl game-NFL playoffs-championship game-NFL championship games-Super Bowl-Valentine's Day.

*some events are interchangeable depending on when games are scheduled. This represents my list for this year, 2015

Then you get a break until it's getting close to March Madness time. 

While that may sound kind of odd to some of my writer friends, or other folks who really don't like or care about NCAA football, to my friends down South--and especially the ones who, like me, really enjoy the Paul Finebaum Show and SEC football--it sounds perfectly normal. I think we all gauge our seasons that way. And while my Song of the South is hardcore University of Tennessee Orange and White (God's team--why, you ask? Because God loves to hear "Rocky Top"), there are equally fascinating and important stories from my friends who (wrongly) bleed crimson, yell "WAR DAMN EAGLE!!" or "WOO PIG SOOIE!"(misguided), or feel their team is disrespected by the rest of the SEC (looking at you Mizzou). 

So I've been thinking. The incredibly fascinating range of stories that make up this seasonal Song of the South would make for a fun series of blog posts. I've extended an invitation to my fellow Finebaum callers/Twitter moguls to tell me their stories about why they love their teams. What made them Vols For Life, or Bammers? What made them love LSU so much that they misspell 'go' by intentionally substituting "e-a-u-x" for the "o"? (Geaux Tigers! Cracks me up every time I see it)  For every true college football fan is that moment of origin, the split second that took them from fan to fanatic. Living in Ohio, I have learned that while Ohio State fans are equally loud and just as annoying and unrealistic as the worst fans of SEC teams, their loyalty to the Buckeyes seems to be genetically imprinted upon them in utero. For some reason, folks up here love their Buckeyes because they're supposed to. Back home, fans learn to love their team--sometimes outraging whole generations of their family if they learn to love the WRONG SEC team. For example--Alabama/Auburn fans. Two great schools, two storied football programs only 160 miles apart. It is not unheard of for a kid of Alabama parents to almost literally fall in love with Auburn--either as an act of teenage defiance or just because they watch the right game at the right time. Fistfights start at weddings if someone utters "Roll Tide" at the wrong moment. 

And don't get me started on trees. 

So I'm going to compile this Song of the South. After all I am a writer, and the only thing I love more than hearing a good story is the opportunity to tell one. And if nothing else, I'll get to hear all those great stories. 

What? Football season is only 14 days away! I have to do something to pass the time, and Rocky Top only has two verses.

And who can resist a team with an entrance like this?

Only fourteen more days until the Song of the South starts for my Volunteers.

Wish that I was on ole Rocky Top

Down in the Tennessee hills.

Ain't no smoggy smoke on Rocky Top

Ain't no telephone bills...

"Rocky Top":lyrics by Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, 1967

first released by Osbourne Brothers, 1967

FANdom, FANaticism and Kiss My FANny

So today I got into a Twitter war. 

Yeah, I know. Big shocker. I usually try really really hard to avoid those, mostly because words are the primary tools of my trade. Getting into a squabble with a Twitter troll is really wrong of me. It's the equivalent of Muhammad Ali or Mike Tyson squaring up in the ring with Pee Wee Herman--the audience knows Pee Wee is horrifically outmatched, but just cannot turn away from the carnage. 

Like taking an Uzi to a paintball game.

At any rate, what started the fight was an argument over what constitutes a fan. A guy who roots for Florida during football season and Duke during basketball season instigated the event, and even though I used small words and tried to type slowly he chose to ignore the point I was trying to make.

To me, there's a lot of difference between a FAN and a FANATIC, even though the first term evolved from the second. For example--

I am a University of Tennessee FAN. I have always been a UT FAN--one of my earliest memories is watching football with my dads and uncles and cousins during some holiday at my grandparents' house. I have only ever rooted for UT, no matter the sport. When I was a teenager, our football program was being rebuilt and our basketball team, frankly, sucked, but I only ever pulled for the Vols. In my adult life, I have never worn another school's colors. While I will watch and pull for a team in a non-UT game, I've never rooted against UT because I liked another team better during that sport's season. When Tennessee was abysmal, I never wavered. The first song I sang to my babies and my daughters' babies? Rocky Top. I have several orange and white cats. Their names? Tennessee, Volunteer, Rocky...and Caesar. (Always have to have one oddball.)Rocky has a little sister who's gray. Her name? Smoky. And even though orange is absolutely NOT my color, I have UT shirts, fleeces, jackets, sweats, scarves, hats, gloves, ball caps, purses, travel bag, billfolds (two of them, both with grass and hedge leaves from Neyland), big fleece blanket, ice cooler, pitcher and cups set,light switch plates, rear view mirror block T, seat covers, flag, and innumerable Smokey stuffed dogs in this house. My daughter's twins just turned one. Before they were born, my son-in-law and I made an agreement--he gets one twin for UK basketball stardom and I get the other for UT football. And to top it all off, every single flower in my flower beds and garden is ORANGE. Not pink, or white, or lavender, or red, or blue, or purple. ORANGE.

Suffice it to say I am a Vol for life. Why is that? Because I am a FAN of UT. Being a good FAN is a full time job during the fall and winter. Especially from November-January, when football and basketball are both going on along with other less-visible but equally important sports. And if we lived closer than eight hours away, I'd have season tickets for Neyland Stadium.

So here's my question that caused such a ruckus today on Twitter: is it possible for someone to be a FAN of one school for football and a totally different school for basketball?

Obviously, some have extenuating circumstances. For example, I didn't go to UT; I went to Austin Peay State University, which is the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in the state of Tennessee. I had a full scholarship at APSU, and when I was competing (I was a state and regional champion in public speaking, and placed at nationals several years which is yet another reason I shouldn't get into twitter wars with the debatorially challenged), I wore the school colors. APSU is my alma mater. But I can count the number of athletic events I went to at Austin Peay on one hand, although even then I was making 3-4 trips to Neyland Stadium each fall. Even then I was a UT FAN.

Then there's the Manning family dilemma. Archie Manning, father of Peyton and Eli, was a beloved Ole Miss quarterback. When Peyton was QB for the Vols, Archie would show up for the games--but I don't EVER remember him donning orange and white. He was rooting for the Vols because his son played for them, but he was  ALWAYS an Ole Miss Rebel.

This guy on Twitter doesn't have those or ANY extenuating circumstances. He is a Florida FANATIC because they always won when he was a kid, and he is a Duke FANATIC because they always won. So now, Florida will always win football and Duke will always win basketball regardless of what the reality is for both teams. Where I come from, that's called BANDWAGON, and this guy is totally pulling that bandwagon along behind his tractor with a flat tire.

I love to talk sports with folks from every SEC school, sometimes getting really deep into the mechanics of the game. Why? Because I really love football and am a student of the game. And there are a lot of FANS out there who are the same way. But this guy has no interest in the actual game. All he wants to do is regurgitate whatever 'facts' he pulled up on Google and Wikipedia to 'prove' he's right. And if someone disagrees with him, he goes on an insult rampage.

For example--

Today, in his continuing fairy tale about his Gators, he pronounced as usual that Florida would go 9-3 for the season, win the SEC, and go to the playoffs. Since the Gators don't appear to have anyone on their offensive line who's played a snap of SEC football, haven't named a quarterback, haven't really got any receivers or powerful running back, and who lost many of their defensive starters to the NFL and most of their commits to Auburn when Will Muschamp was hired there--because of all that, anyone who understands football tells him he's crazy. He also said that Mark Richt was no good, despite UGA consistently winning 9-10 games every season for a decade, that Nick Saban is washed up, and that Arkansas's Brent Bielema is a trash coach who 'ain't never beat nobody'.

Triple negatives are very difficult to translate and diagram, by the way. *wince* You know,  since they're GODAWFUL choices and frighteningly ungrammatical. Makes my brain hurt just looking at it.

At any rate, this is how deluded this guy is. And when I countered with--you know, facts?--his response was and I quote:

           Douchebag bandwagon idiot: There aint* no prostitutes in Tenessee. U know why?  There all volunteers--ask Celina 

*all spelling errors left intact on purpose 

Um...do what?                        

This after he told me to 'learn sports babe'.

What. The. Hell.

You know what? In college sports especially, people LOVE their teams. They  are passionate about their schools. You don't wander around UT during February and find everyone is wearing a UK shirt. You don't go to Alabama and show up at Toomer's Corner to TP the trees after Auburn beats the Tide in the Iron Bowl. It's just not done. I have about as much interest in college gymnastics or golf as I do my next door neighbor's political views, but  I sure as hell celebrate when UT does well in ANY sport. And what about the two games Florida and Duke have played in the last couple of decades' worth of NCAA tournaments? Who did the bandwagon fan root for, since the series is even at 1-1? Florida beat Duke in 2000 and in 1994 Duke beat Florida.

At any rate, after the prostitute comment, I blocked him like I should have done in the first place and saw only one side of the evisceration he received from the state of Alabama.

In my previous post, I talked about finding character studies among the people that writers associate with online. But I totally overlooked the fact that there are a lot of idiots out there who, safe behind their anonymity, cruise the internet looking for someone to fight with. This guy is like that. He calls Finebaum every day, and every day it's the same old routine--"you're not right about my Gators, man; Mark Richt is trash, man; Tennessee ain't got no reason to be hyped, man, they ain't beat nobody in years; Nick Saban is washed up, man; Bielema is a trash coach, man, he ain't never done no good, man"--and when he asks Finebaum a question, he talks OVER Paul's answer just repeating the same old crap over and over. And over. Until finally,mercifully, Paul ends the call and his entire viewing audience turns the volume back up on the TV.

So here's the gig: you're a FAN when you truly love one school/team in all things. You're a FAN when you stick with your team and wear their colors both during good years and bad. You're a FAN when your devotion to your school/team is unvaried for years--decades.

You're a FANATIC when you are incapable of listening when reasonable people are discussing your team in an honest manner. You're a FANATIC when you lose your shit because someone criticizes your team. You're a FANATIC when your idea of 'winning' an argument is to talk loudly and nonstop. You're a FANATIC when, despite your team having NO offense and only one great player (Vernon Hargreaves is, without a doubt, an absolute BEAST of a defensive back--top two in the nation probably) and a coach in his first year of being a SEC head coach and a brutal SEC schedule (relieved by a plethora of cupcakes) you still announce on a daily basis that your team is going to win the whole conference.

The only thing this guy is a FAN of is himself.

Right before I blocked him, he was saying that the reason everyone hates him is because he called the Finebaum show last March and said the Duke would win the national championship instead of Kentucky. Since Duke won the NCAA on several of my ballots, I didn't have a problem with that. Instead, I told him the truth--the reason people hate you is because you're rude and you won't listen to reasonable people's differing points of view. And in response, he equated me to a hooker.

In the end, I guess, it can all be boiled down to a fairly simple premise. FAN is derived from FANATIC and shares a lot of the same qualities. There's no doubt that the infamous Bama tree-murderer Harvey Updike is a FAN of the Alabama Crimson Tide. But there's also no doubt that Harvey is a FANATIC, because only a FANATIC would have poisoned those big, beautiful trees at Toomer's Corner  in Auburn. The folks who were just a FAN would have had a few more beers and gone to bed ticked off, but would have awakened the next day thinking "Next year we'll stomp them." A FAN wouldn't have destroyed those lovely, ancient, tradition-rich oak trees just to piss Auburn fans off.

Does anyone else wonder what kind of thought processes must have gone on in that man's mind to kill those trees and then to call Paul Finebaum up two days later and brag about having poisoned the trees to a national Sirius radio audience? That thought process is the missing link between FAN and FANATIC. I wonder if he was able to recognize that while he was in jail.

Etymologically, FANATIC means insane person, from the Latin root fanaticus meaning mad, enthusiastic, furious--and specifically was meant to describe zealots from the church--temples, in Rome, specifically the followers of Bacchus whose religion was all about going crazy. FANATIC, therefore, is meant to be a negative term, whereas FAN is a positive one. Or, as Winston Churchill famously put it:

A fanatic is someone who won't change his mind and can't change the subject.

So yeah, that FANATIC can kiss my FANny. I am a FAN of Tennessee, and his Gators are going down this year.

The jerk.