A Free Man

In celebration of the imminent humiliation for the state’s flagship university, I’m happy to present an expanded Florida Hate Week edition of Deep South Smack Talk. Speaking for the evil swamp lizards, we have my oldest friend and occasional A Free Man commentor, Jamie. He and I went through high school together and despite his questionable academic pedigree, Jamie’s one of the sharpest folks I know. He’s currently a professor of history in the heart of Mormon country. I’m hoping to convince Jamie to be a periodic guest blogger here at A Free Man, so let’s show him some love. Or, more appropriately, hate. 

Of Chris’ many wanderings and meandering through life, no turn has surprised me more than his (recent) emergence as a fan of the most miserable Georgia Bulldogs.  Allow me to explain.  Chris and I grew up in a wretched little town in North Florida and attended an even more wretched high school, about which Chris has blogged of late.  Academics were of almost no import at said institution, and of the graduating class of over 400 (more than 600 were in our sophomore class), less than 20 (perhaps less than fifteen) went on to a four-year college or university right away.  Only two or three went out of state, one being Chris, but he did not initially go to UGA.  College was simply not expected, and no guidance was given, the counselors more concerned with stemming the massive drop-out rate.  I ended up at the University of Florida because it was close by and I really had no idea that there were other options.  (Now this was a good thing, as in all seriousness, UF is by far the best public university until you hit UNC to the north and UT to the west.  I could whip out all kinds of stats to demonstrate this, but I won’t bore you).  The point is that I did not choose UF (and I will leave it to A Free Man to tell how he ended up at what he, with a wink, calls the finest educational institution in the South), and I certainly did not go there because of UF football, although I was already a fan of sorts, as were about 1/3 of the town.

What I can assure you is that Chris was not a fan of the Dogs in high school, although about 1/3 of the high school population were, the other 1/3 being Florida State U. fans (with a sprinkling of mutant Miami fans thrown in).  In a town and high school with so little connections to higher learning, how did people choose their team?  Well, I did have some relatives that went to UF (and also FSU), but I think it was probably pretty random why one choose to root for UF or FSU.  However, it was not random if you chose to wear the red and the black (in complete ignorance of those colors’ historic and political significance).  You chose UGA to proclaim you were the biggest, dumbest, most profane redneck of them all.   You picked an out-of-state school, much further away, precisely because no one you knew had ever gone to school there, in fact, it had no connection to school what so ever.  You just thought it marked you as a bad ass, and its relation to the Deep South (more so than any Florida school) bore all the unfortunate racial connotations you might expect.  So imagine my surprise years later when my friend started blathering about the glories of going “between the hedges” (which must also be slang for some bizarre sexual practice).

I would be curious to know when Chris actually became a fan of the Dogs and how many games he actually attended, because it did not really seem his style while he was living in the, I admit, most pleasant town of Athens.  I suspect, like myself, he became a true fan years later after having left Athens.  My first year at UF I went to all the games like any other stupid newbie, but a trip to Mexico and the lefty political types I hung around with soon convinced me that football was for the brain-dead, plastic-fantastic mainstream.  I started scalping my tickets after that (I was also desperately poor, so that made it easier).  And while I was more likely to find myself being asked to leave a political rally by a smartly dressed law enforcement agent (I like to imagine it was Secret Service) for yelling to Dan Quayle “Can you spell “cat”?” than attend a football game, I still went to a game or so a year for old time’s sake.  But I was no longer a fan, even the indifferent one I had been in high school.  I became a true fan again only after I had moved away, and as a Florida boy, was freezing my ass off experiencing winter for the first time in Pittsburgh and wondering why people thought I talked funny.  It took a few years, and by then I was way too lefty and, I imagined, hip to publicly admit I cared about football. But I did; it gave me a connection to home, and to my surprise I found myself depressed after a UF loss (next year!) and elated after a victory.  So I should forgive my friend for his apostasy, I suppose, as the heart of the college football fan is a strange and unmapped territory.

Okay, I know this is supposed to be smack talk so forgive the digression above, and let’s get to it.  Umm, let’s see….GEORGIA SUX…no, no, I can do better, just give me a second…

On the first day of the eleventh month of the two thousand and eighth year in the Faulknerian fever swamp of Jacksonville, two forces will meet, one representing good and the other the most foul and pestilential evil.  Our beloved Gators will come for vengeance.  The force of arms shall be our only ornament-our only rest, the fight.  Upon entering the arena, as Urban Meyer brings forth the machine he has constructed of the blood and sinew of mere mortals, he will turn to the assembled Bulldogs, shaking but perhaps still confident in their arrogance, and proclaim: “Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair.”

And then we shall see the Evil Creature known as Uga gathering his forces and armies to fight against the wise Urban Meyer and his army. And the Evil Creature will be captured, and with him the False Prophet, Mark Richt, who could do mighty miracles when the Evil Creature is present—miracles that deceive all who have accepted the Evil Creature’s mark [G], and who worship his flea-infested, mange-ridden carcass.  Both of them—the Evil Creature and his False Prophet—will be thrown alive into the Lake of Fire that burns with sulfur [also known as losing by three touchdowns].  And their entire army shall be killed with the sharp sword of Tim Tebow and all the Gators of the heavens will gorge on the flesh of the dog.

And when the battle is complete and the tableau is one of the dogs’ utter ruin, the Gators will leave the field triumphant, the pride of having vanquished a scurrilous foe their only reward, with none of the pathetic parading the dogs embarrassed themselves with last year.  The dogs will lay on the field destroyed, defeated, and in despair, weeping at their own futile efforts and gross inadequacies—the only sound the groans and cries of the beaten dogs and the lamentations of their women.  And they will finally know their place and bow their heads before their betters.

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Well, Jamie’s certainly raised the bar for Deep South Smack Talk - Courtney, Angel you’re going to have to take it up a notch. Your underwhelming apostate is currently constructing his defense of the Georgia Bulldog Nation and, apparently, his place in it. 

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I can’t think of a more appropriate artist to accompany this post than Hank Williams III. The son of Bocephus and the grandson of the godfather of country music, Hank III has a new album, “Damn Right Rebel Proud”, out on Curb Records. It’s a pure, old-school country stomp with a bit of punk ethic thrown in to differentiate it from your Grandaddy’s country music. Hank III is blogger friendly, so if you like what you hear, support him by buying his new album.

 

 Hank Williams III - "Me And My Friends" [3:13m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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