Football Widows Find a Lot to Cheer About in Column

My opinions do not always inspire the enthusiastic support of women. My recent argument against women in combat provoked mixed reactions, to put the best light on it.

However, my examination of the domestic conflict provoked by the intrusion of weekend football on TV has produced some gratifying applause from housewives and posslqs (persons of opposite sex sharing living quarters).

I observed that my wife has never liked football, though she tried, and that our house was divided by the game. I could spend as many as 12 hours watching college and pro games on Saturdays and Sundays, while she read the paper, cleaned house, ironed or gardened.

Ann Fink of San Diego writes that she is also a football widow, but that she has a plan for fighting back.

“Every fall I sink into a deep funk as my husband sinks into the couch for football weekends. Try as I can, I can’t raise my spirits until the Super Bowl is over. I mourn the loss of our walks together, talks together, rides to visit our grown kids in the Southland, strolls through art museums, drives into the country. . . .

“Because my husband is unreasonable and intractable about giving up one moment in front of the TV, I have decided that my only retribution is not to buy any product advertised by companies sponsoring this annual ‘breakup’ of what’s left of the American nuclear family.”

Mrs. Fink hopes I will print her letter so that other football widows can join her boycott.

Some readers did blame me for my wife’s football malaise.

“Your list of your wife’s activities in your absence hardly resembles a Sunday picnic,” writes Michelle Bekey of Venice. “Ironing, washing and gardening? I’ve seen some studies lately suggesting that men have twice as much leisure time as women. With all due respect, your column helped explain why. Perhaps you could propose a creative--and workable--solution?”

Watching football can hardly be classified as leisure. Any man who is a student of the game is thoroughly engaged, intellectually, by the action. He must understand the run-and-shoot offense, the nickel defense and other intricacies and strategies. Watching two games on a Sunday can be exhausting, not even counting the effects of the beer one drinks.

Oddly, I have heard from two women who like football--one a woman whose boyfriend is not a fan. “I am the one addicted to football,” writes Liz Redwing of North Hollywood, “and I’m a 31-year-old female. My boyfriend couldn’t care less. And I am the one who calls him in to see the great replays, but, alas, they mean little or nothing to him.”

Redwing doesn’t say whether her boyfriend does the housework while she’s watching the games.

There may be many women like Mary B. Curtius of Yorba Linda, who has a personal reason for liking football. “I tolerated football and barely understood it until something happened: My son started playing. First, youth football, then high school ball, now college (UCSB quarterback). As we know, mothers will go above and beyond the call of duty for their children. Now I understand and love football.”

As I said, I find that I hardly watch football anymore. Perhaps that’s because, unlike Mrs. Curtius, I no longer have any heroes in the game. Pat Haden is gone, Jim Plunkett is gone, Fred Dryer is gone (though I still see him on TV as Hunter). I admire Joe Montana but I don’t love him, the way I loved Jim Plunkett and the way Mrs. Curtius undoubtedly loves her son.

In fact, I have watched only one football game this season, and I didn’t quite get through to the end. It was on a recent Monday night. Denver was playing Cleveland, and both had exciting quarterbacks. John Elroy for the Denver Broncos and Bernie Kosar for the Browns. It was a great game. Elroy and Kosar were spectacular. The lead kept changing sides, until, at 9 o’clock, with two minutes to go, Denver led, 29-27.

I had a dilemma. I wanted to see Cleveland win, but I didn’t think they could do it. Meanwhile, the second episode in the three-part miniseries, Jackie Collins’ “Lucky/Chances,” was to begin at 9. We had seen the first episode. It was outrageous trash: comic-book characters indulging in sex, violence, prostitution, gangsterism, betrayal, murder, adultery.

Should I watch the end of the game, or should I watch the second episode of the miniseries? It wasn’t a question of pleasing my wife. She could watch the miniseries in the living room.

With time running out I finally abandoned the football game and went in to join my wife in watching “Lucky/Chances.”

Perhaps I am becoming more cultured.

By the way, I read in the paper Tuesday that Cleveland kicked a field goal and won, 30-29.