Super Sunday

I was in the bathroom when I heard my brother yell, "touchdown!" The Giants had just scored to take the lead with 40 seconds left in Super Bowl XLII. The mighty Patriots, undefeated and supposedly unbeatable, suddenly faced a shocking loss in the game expected to cap off their perfect season.

Instead it proved that karma really can come around to bite you in the back.

I normally root for excellence. No pro sports franchise had achieved more of it in one season than New England. But all season the Patriots' arrogant and classless coach Bill Belichick practically begged for the humbling that the Giants finally handed him. How fitting that it happened on the biggest stage in American sports.

I didn't care that much. I wanted the Giants to win but I had accepted the conventional wisdom that they likely would not. Games interest me but the older I get the less willing I am to let their outcomes affect my happiness. It was enough for me to have the game on while I edited photographs I had taken earlier in the day (see the posts below with results of the efforts) and hung out with my brother Jim at my parents' house.

Both Jim and my father seemed to have more at stake. Every Giants failure would spark an eruption of expletives. No credit went to the Patriots. Their good plays happened not because of what they did, only what New York did not. It is the typical McQuiston mindset that nothing ever just happens to us. We always do something to earn our misfortunes. Everything was the Giants' fault.

Perhaps Freud would have something to say about our rooting so ardently for a team that was supposed to lose, something about how, in doing so, we sought reinforcement of our inferiority. But Freud's not saying much these days. He's dead.

And so is the Patriots perfect season. It surprised me, though. I thought Tom Brady's touchdown drive would go down in Super Bowl lore as the game winner, not the one Eli Manning engineered in reply.

It capped off a good day for me. We had chamber of commerce weather - sunny and around 80 degrees - I played my guitar, worked out, took some good pictures, spent time with my family, enjoyed a fine dinner (Jim can cook!) and watched New England get its just desserts.

Super Sunday, indeed.