Taking One for the Team

Every evening I get down on my knees and thank the good Lord and Baby Jesus that my boyfriend isn't into sports. OK, so that isn't entirely true. He digs soccer and anything that is included in the X Games, being an ex-x-gamer, himself. (At one point he even moved to Utah for better snowboarding.) But when it comes to Monday night football, or Yankees vs. Mets, he couldn't care less. And that is just one of the many, many things I love about him.

Call me closed-minded, but I've just never done well dating sports fans. No matter how many times a guy has tried to explain to me what a first down is, it never sinks in. The next time I watch a football game I'll inevitably wonder, "What the heck is going on here?"

Sports fans also have a tendency to get fanatical, which is incredibly unattractive to me. If you have to wear the same boxers every Sunday a game is on so your team won't break their winning, "streak," then there is something wrong with you. Sorry. There just is.

In my early twenties, a guy I was dating took me to task for saying I would never enjoy football. He said that it was selfish to close oneself off from something one's SO enjoys. Maybe so. He even suggested that it was a girl's duty to feign interest in her boyfriend's hobbies; that she should take one for the team by suffering through endless, mind-numbing hours just to make him happy. That she should devote time and energy to learning about the ins and outs of the game so she could intelligently discuss it. I'd just like to point out that years later that guy is long gone and my dislike for football remains.

What does that tell you?