Bison Football Saturdays with Dad
I wanted to wait until after the title game to write this but I felt now was just as good a time. It might get a little long and sappy and maybe a little boring in the middle, but it's from the heart, and I wanted to share these few thoughts with my fellow Bisonvillers.
I am a 33 year old young man that grew up on 15th St. and 3rd Ave. N. in Fargo. Exactly 9 blocks south of NDSU. Both of my parents attended NDSU but neither graduated from there. My dad transfered to MSUM to finish his business degree. But our family was a Bison loving family as long as I can remember. We went to many Bison BB games while growing up watching the likes of Joe Reineer and Pat Smykowski. I was also in the Bison Buddies program with my sister for a few years. We went to a ton of wrestling matches including George Thompsons match where he reversed the guy with seconds to go for the NCAA D2 title. My dad still says his greatest memory of Bison wrestling was seeing Bill Demeray and Bob Backlund win back to back titles with pins in 1970(?). We went to many football games out at the old Dacotah field where I mostly ran around with other kids in the NW corner playing our own game of football. I would have to say though, that about the time the Bison moved in the FFD is when I really started becoming a die hard Bison football fan. If my memory serves me right, I think I made most home games in my HS years. Even did some traveling with dad to St. Cloud, Sioux Falls, Brookings, Grand Forks and even took a game in down in Vermillion. Add in Spokane, Minneapolis, Ames, Laramie and Cedar Falls too. For most of these events it was usually just my dad and I while my sister and mom would stay home to shop or do whatever it is women do. Mom would tag along occasionally for BB games, including last years home game against SDSU where she sat next to Kevin Feeney and talked his ear off the whole game. She said he was one of the nicest people she's met. She would come to an occasional football game too and actually came to the Robert Morris game last December. She may not have attended regularly as Dad and I but she was a Bison fan to the core. And even said "Sioux Suck" from time to time.
Well around the first of this year, she started to not feel very well. She started losing weight and was thinking it was because she was doing Weight Watchers and that explained her lack of appetite. Well on April 7th, 2011 after not feeling well for about 4 months, she was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer. It was not operable, and she refused chemo and radiation to make her quality of life for her last days on earth better. On June 9th, I lost my mother to cancer. My dad lost a wife of 38 years, and a great friend of 43 years, to a nasty disease that changed our whole family and lives forever. Dad gets pretty lonely at times, but even though he is retired, he's been able to keep busy with some part time work delivering phone directories. There isn't a day that goes by that my sister, myself or my dad think about mom.
That's where we are today, on this magical journey our Bison football team has allowed us as fans to share with them. Dad and I could not have asked for a better fall of Bison football than the one we're going through right now. It has helped us get closer, and spend some real quality time together doing something that we both absolutely love. This season, regardless of what happens in Frisco, will go down as one of the best I've ever had as a Bison fan. I know my mom will be looking down from heaven on the 7th, with the best seat in the house, wearing some Bison yellow and cheering as loudly as she can.
Last edited by 17>1; 12-22-2011 at 12:30 PM.
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Originally Posted by Notorious
