I have to confess, I wish the Bengals had another bye today. Ever since NFL season began, I have basically become a single parent on Sunday afternoons. My husband will disagree with this, but I have tried to learn to like football. I really have. I just don’t. In fact, I kinda hate it. And that should be ok. I don’t have to like everything my husband does. But he takes it as a personal assault that the woman he loves hates something he adores; I just can’t help it.
In years past, meaning years when the Bengals sucked, missing the game had not been a major issue. Sure, he’d prefer to watch it and would watch it every chance he got, but it wasn’t the end of the world if he missed a game. But now that the Bengals are doing so well, Sundays between 12:30-5pm has become dedicated Bengals time. End of story.
The first couple of weekends of football season, the girls and I tried to be supportive and hang out during the game, eat some dip, pretend we were interested in the game. Hey, I even wore an orange shirt. But c’mon, I just don’t get the draw, and my girls are two and four. My four-year-old is a girly-girl and is probably a lost cause in trying to convert her to the game. He might have a shot in creating a football buddy in our younger one, but not yet. For now, it’s clear we are uninterested, thus invisible to my husband when the Orange and Black appear on the television screen unless, God forbid, we dare to step in front of the TV during a critical play!
A few weekends ago, friends of ours came over during the game. The wife loves football. The husband, like myself, does not. After enduring a painful two hours of the game, the husband (my friend, that is) and I decided to cut our losses and take my girls to the park. It was a beautiful day outside, so it just seemed like a waste for the non-fans to stay inside. His wife stayed and watched the rest of the game with my husband. When my neighbor saw our male friend and I loading my children into the car while our counterparts stayed inside, she joked, “That’s how rumors get started!” But it’s so not like that obviously.
Don’t get my wrong, my husband is a very involved, dedicated family-man, but these Sundays are starting to bother me. The following Sunday, another gorgeous day, I decided to take the girls to the zoo by myself (first time ever – and a brave move on my part!) while my husband watched the game. When I left for the zoo, I told him, in a rather beatchy way, “Don’t get used to this because it can’t happen every week.” This was the first time I raised a fuss about the game, but I felt I had to. Our time together, with the kids, is very limited. We both work, so we don’t get home with the kids until nearly 7pm every night. After dinner and baths, it’s basically time to go to bed and start all over again. The weekends are our only good bulk of quality time together, and I hate there is this division for the better part of one of these precious “quality time” days. I mean, I doubt he’d be happy if I were to tell him that every Saturday from 12:30-5pm I was going to watch a Project Runway Marathon and not to bother me.
I know, I should be more understanding. My husband makes so many sacrifices for me and the kids, and on any other day or time, he’s there with us - with bells on - dancing. I should not complain about the time he spends on this one outside passion. Most husbands are doing this very same, arguably harmless thing every Sunday afternoon. It’s just that it’s every Sunday. For over four hours. I miss him. A lot. I never thought I’d be jealous of a bunch of oversized men in tights, but I am. Jerks.
My friends say I should look forward to a few years from now, when while he’s watching football every Sunday, I can go shopping all day with the girls. Just hand me the wallet and enjoy the game, honey. Yeah, I bet it wouldn’t be too long before he’d be missing games to be with us, check card securely in hand.
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