America--it tastes good because of all the fat
I have taken a few days off this weekend. After that 23 hour trip to L.A. I was pretty well exhausted and managed to wake up and then fall back asleep while getting dressed on Friday, thereby arriving at work four hours late. I then slept until 2:00 PM on Saturday (although not straight through, oh no, I had to be woken up at 2:30 AM to go pick up my friend with alcohol poisoning from the hospital.)
On Sunday, I went up north to my home town, Cloquet Minnesota. A little under a year ago, Steven Wells of the English newspaper The Guardian wrote an article entitled How Soccer is Eating America. I thought it was an interesting read then. But having just been up north, I've witnessed it first hand. In my home town, population less than 12,000, there are at least ten soccer fields. The baseball diamond at Meddich field has a soccer pitch in the outfield that gets more use than the diamond. My cousins, triplets aged 10 are all on the local U-11 B squad; that is, they're second string; there is already a full squad of eighteen ten-year-olds ahead of them. Driving down my grandparents street, I saw a sign pointing the way to the soccer fields where there used to be a batter pictured. One of the players on the team was wearing a Norwich City kit and recognized the Newcastle shirt I was wearing. Several of them like to watch what little soccer they can find on TV.
It warms the cockles of my heart. Soccer is growing in the US. Slowly, perhaps. At the youth level up, perhaps. In participation if not viewership, perhaps. But it's growing, and I'm happy to be there to see it happen.
On Sunday, I went up north to my home town, Cloquet Minnesota. A little under a year ago, Steven Wells of the English newspaper The Guardian wrote an article entitled How Soccer is Eating America. I thought it was an interesting read then. But having just been up north, I've witnessed it first hand. In my home town, population less than 12,000, there are at least ten soccer fields. The baseball diamond at Meddich field has a soccer pitch in the outfield that gets more use than the diamond. My cousins, triplets aged 10 are all on the local U-11 B squad; that is, they're second string; there is already a full squad of eighteen ten-year-olds ahead of them. Driving down my grandparents street, I saw a sign pointing the way to the soccer fields where there used to be a batter pictured. One of the players on the team was wearing a Norwich City kit and recognized the Newcastle shirt I was wearing. Several of them like to watch what little soccer they can find on TV.
It warms the cockles of my heart. Soccer is growing in the US. Slowly, perhaps. At the youth level up, perhaps. In participation if not viewership, perhaps. But it's growing, and I'm happy to be there to see it happen.
posted by Zathras at 6:06 AM
4 Comments:
The link doesn't work--or, rather, it just redirects you to the page you're on.
And, hooray for that kid wearing a Canaries kit. :D
It should be fixed now.
Speaking as a rather firmly entrenched Marxist, I'd have to say that the "socialist" aspects of soccer are a sign of a good and proper community growth.
While at the same time, any sport, even one as team oriented as soccer, has a degree of competition (for places in the lineup if nothing else) which feeds a healthy competativeness and desire to be better.
America's individualism is what made it a superpower, but its ability to combine that individualism with alliance to other groups (without losing that individual identity) is what will make it truly great in ways that can surpass the Roman Empire, Mayan civilization or Sumerian culture. (I hope)
America's individualism is what made it an imperialistic power. If it weren't for the socialist aspect of sharing the burden in building infrastructure in our past, we never would have been able to enjoy so much success economically. That is why the Japanese, South Koreans, and now the Chinese will kick our ass. While we spend all of our time bickering about funding roads and schools without using tax money, they do whatever it takes as a nation to make sure they have the transportation and telecomm and education systems in place for their businesses to be successful.I remember when the US was that way, but now it seems we seek to further our position in the world by invading and intimidating.
Post a Comment
<< Home