Like the Internet the day after an episode of Lost I have on TiVo, I tried to avoid everything that had anything to do with the demolition of the Orange Bowl. The video on the Miami Herald (have they no mercy?). TV news stories. The 836. The first two were pretty easy - after the day after the demo, the video would be buried and news would move on to the next tragic event. But the 836? At some point I would have no choice. That day was last week when I had to schlep to MIA. It wasn't as traumatic as I thought it was going to be, considering it's hard to look sideways for very long going, um, the lawful speed limit. But I felt its absence, the gaping hole where so many of my Saturdays were spent growing up. And it sucked. Warning: the rest of this blog entry is wicked sentimental and mushy.
I moved to Miami in 1980 when I was three years old. My dad accepted a job at the University of Miami and immediately bought football season tickets. Hence, I've been going to 'Canes games for a long freakin time. For a lot of that time I never saw them lose, thanks to their insane at-home winning streak. The people around us - though I don't know any of their names to this day and have never seen them outside of the OB - became our OB family, faces we'd see every other weekend, hands we'd high five after touchdowns, eyes we'd see well up after crushing defeats. It's the only place I've ever seen my notoriously mellow dad pump his fist, scream, yell things like "yeah, baby!"
When I went to college - at UM - I would spend the first half of the game in the student section, counting the seconds until halftime when I would head to the other side of the stadium to join my "family." I preferred tailgating with my dad's friends - fellow professors, mostly - to beer bonging with my fellow students. The food and booze were much better, anyway: those brutal noon games meant bloody Marys and omelets on the grill. Night games meant themes - Mexican fiesta, Oktoberfest, even Thanksgiving (one my mother was so not happy about). These were the people who watched me grow up - graduations, new boyfriends, new jobs, more new boyfriends.
I'm sure I'm not the first person to say this, but for me, the Orange Bowl wasn't just some dilapidated sporting arena. It was a second home. It was me and my dad's place. We have our season tickets for next season, of course (and the seats are decent, surprisingly), so new traditions and new memories will be made. But I'm still in mourning. Maybe I always will be - for Wide Left, for The Drive, for "the swagger." So in honor of the OB, here's some old-ass footage of the stadium in anticipation of a Police concert. Working on getting more footage, so stay tuned.
In the meantime, the University of Miami baseball team is ranked number one (yes NUMBER ONE) - go check them out against St. Mary's this weekend at Mark Light Stadium. (Which isn't going anywhere).
-- miaeditor
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