In only five days time, history will be made–history that will have a huge impact on my household. For the first time ever, the West Virginia Mountaineers and the Alabama Crimson Tide will do battle on the football field. The two teams will play at this Saturday’s Chick-Fil-A Kickoff Game at the Georgia Dome. What a way to kick off the college football season!
Since Alabama and West Virginia has never played each other, our allegiances have never been an issue. But this weekend, I’ll be rooting for Alabama and my husband, Dale, will root for West Virginia. Dale loves his home state. We have family there, we own land there, and we spend Thanksgiving week hunting and vacationing there. West Virginia gets teased a lot, but it is a beautiful state with an abundance of pristine land and breathtaking majestic mountain views.
“When are we going to settle in West Virginia?”, asks Dale on a regular basis.
“When we are debt-free”, I reply. (Note to self: “Always keep a balance.”)
It’s not that I don’t appreciate the gorgeous landscapes and the pretty forests, it’s just that there are too many of them. With nearly 80 percent of West Virginia covered in trees, that doesn’t leave a lot of room for Marshall’s and TJMaxx. I’ve been known to shop the aisles of the country convenience store near our hunting camp because I’m suffering from retail withdrawal. But, how many packages of pork rinds can you buy? The way I see it, there’s rural, and then there’s West Virginia. Need more proof? Those steep mountain roads don’t even have guard rails! Me? I prefer to live year-round in the comforts of suburban civilization.
With the Tide fresh off their sixth straight 10-win season and an 18-game winning streak away from home, I’m pretty confident that Alabama will win the game. Unless, of course, Nick Saban bows to his own West Virginia roots. Saban is a native of Fairmont, West Virginia and a former Assistant Coach for WVU. Above all else, West Virginians love their home state. The New York Times even wrote an article about it with this excerpt:
But the joke they are most likely to tell is the one in which St. Peter is escorting a soul through heaven and is asked why there is a section that is walled-off. He replies: “Oh, that’s where we put the West Virginians. Otherwise they try to go back home on the weekend.”
Whether the Mountaineers win or not, after Saturday’s game, they’ll be singing “County Roads Take Me Home.” And, with both teams receiving $3.2 million each for their participation as well as a $50,000 donation allocated toward the creation of an endowed scholarship, you can bet they’ll be happy about it.
As for me, I’ll be paying the minimum on my credit card while humming “Sweet Home Alabama”.
Happy Monday,
Mary
P.S. What about you? Do you and your spouse root for the same teams? Do you share the same dream location for retirement? And, if not, how will you decide where to spend your golden years?
