It’s the New Year! Yay! It’s already the end of January but it feels like nothing has really changed, and I still write ‘2016’ on all my papers. I always expect some sort of moment of monumental change or insight to come to me at the beginning of each year but I always end up feeling robbed of this life-changing experience. I used to think it was because I wasn’t allowed to stay up until midnight, and that if I reached that hour I would activate some sort of secret New Year’s wisdom, but the first time I got to experience this dream it was more of a disappointment than a milestone. I can’t remember exactly what year it was, but my fami-ly had attempted to drive up to our lake house in North Carolina only to discover that snow made it impossible for us to travel down the lake road, and so we ended up staying in a nearby hotel with our cousins. This change of locations and the presence of snow signified to me that this would be the most exciting New Year ever. We ended up watching a Chopped marathon from nine until right before midnight. My new year is never the start of a completely new me. Because of that, I’m going to talk about a much more exciting subject than my own New Year’s disappointments: The Falcons.

I wish I could say I’ve always been a true supporter of the team, but I’m definitely more of a fair weather fan. The last time I cared about the Falcons was when they went to the NFC Championship a few years back against the San Francisco 49ers. The game before that we played the Seahawks and I remember sitting on my couch in terror as the game came down to the wire. I don’t actually remember any details of the game, just that we won, and that it made me really nervous. My whole family was excited for the possibility of a Super Bowl that year so my dad bought tickets to the championship game.

As my dad drove me, my brother Joe, and my sister Rose to the dome, he told us all about the 49ers and how they used a pistol offense or something. I didn’t really know what it meant but I felt like a football expert with a heightened sense of the game. We were sitting close to the top row of seats, a fact which worried me because I thought I would get a nose-bleed. I didn’t, which I took as a sign of good luck for our chances in the game. I can barely recall actual details from the game but I remember that we were up by around ten points at the first half and my optimism was high, mostly because my dad bought me a hotdog AND a soft pretzel. It was going to be a good day. My happiness evaporated as the Falcons floundered in the second half and I remember turning to my dad and yelling, “I could play better than them!” after a particularly awful attempt at a hail mary. We lost, not by much, but we lost, and that basically marked the end of my illustrious football watching career, although I didn’t know it at the time.

Now, with a real Superbowl on the horizon, I’m back on the Falcons train, and I’m excit-ed to cheer them on in the big game. I don’t feel too invested in it, but it’s a good feeling to be at least a little part of something successful and victorious, so I’d be as happy as the next Fal-cons fan for a win. The crazy part about this football season for me is that, up until the playoffs, I didn’t really have any idea how good the Falcons were. I got so caught up in my own life that I just forgot about something that used to be such a big part of my life. It’s just inter-esting to see how much happens outside my own personal bubble, and it makes me realize how important it is to keep all of my own experiences in perspective, recognizing that this world is home to a lot more people that just me each with their own problems and points of view.