Sorry, Old Sport

I am marginally aware that there is a major sporting event coming up in three days. I won’t be watching. Why start now?

I live in a sports town. I grew up surrounded by sports-loving family members and friends. Some of my favorite people are sports fans. 

So what is it with me? Why don’t I like sports?

I have always been stubbornly resistant to football. And baseball. And basketball and archery and shot put. 

My dad had all the right moves to raise a sports-loving son. He took me to the season opener of the then-Cleveland Indians, cajoled me to attend football and basketball games, and paid for tennis and golf lessons. He told me just to pick one sport and get good at it. I was a decent tennis player in high school, but that was one-and-done. Neither a fit participant nor a rapt spectator, I was doomed to a no man’s land for the apathetic. 

I have zoned out at work when colleagues were gushing about the latest sports news, stared blankly at well-meaning out-of-town waiters soliciting my opinions on Cleveland teams, and looked at the paper's sports page as if it were in hieroglyphics. 

For me, the wide world of sports is like a difficult language I don’t speak, a hidden dimension that would require me to wear special glasses or come from a distant planet to apprehend. 

For us sports-indifferent people, there is nothing worse than being stuck in a conversation about drafts. Discussing who goes to what team and why any of it matters is about as compelling as watching paint dry.

I go to the movies on Superbowl Sunday and have removed ESPN from my streaming service’s channel list. I might tiptoe around watching an Olympic event or two every other year. That’s it. 

My sports aversion used to be a point of pride. Later, in adult life, I came to see it as a deficiency. I was missing out on something from which countless others derived fun, engagement, and common ground. Yes, the same can be said of Broadway musicals, which I do enjoy – but sports are much more pervasive, a lingua franca. 

I just don’t give a damn who has the ball and runs with it the farthest.

If I ever get the chance to be reincarnated, I’d like to come back as a sports lover and see what it feels like to spend a Sunday afternoon shouting at the TV. Or not to look at having tickets to a sporting event as a punishment. 

Until then -- sorry, old sport. I will just have to get vicarious satisfaction out of your enjoyment.