The Bet

So what do you do when you think your team is better than someone else’s team? You make a bet. What do you do when your child decides to cheer for the rival team? You make a bet.

Now, I am not talking about a bet with a bookie with juice and spreads and all that jazz– No… this bet is better than that. This bet is between Audrey (the Gator fan) and me (the Alabama fan). The terms are quite simple. The loser in the SEC Championship game has to wear a spirit shirt for the winning team during our trip to Alabama in December. This will be quite difficult for either of us should our respective team be the losing one.

So here is some of the background story about the inter-family rivalry that has developed in my happy family. I guess I should start with the fact that I have been an Alabama fan pretty much my whole life and fully expected my husband and children to be Bama fans too. I went to the University of Alabama, proudly cheered my team through probation, many different coaching staffs and some not so great seasons. We made a point to subscribe to GamePlan in Colorado so that we could watch all of the Bama games. Now, living in Gator/Seminole country, I still proudly cheer for my Crimson Tide.

Audrey was an Alabama fan too once upon a time. I do realize that this "fan-ship" was a direct byproduct of having two parents who were Bama fans and living in Tuscaloosa. However, Audrey remained an Alabama fan the entire time we lived in Colorado. No cheers for the Colorado Buffalos or the CSU Rams from this child.

Then we moved to Florida... Still she remained an Alabama fan through Kindergarten and 1st Grade. Then our lives were changed forever! Audrey was in Mrs. Appolloni's 2nd Grade class. Not only is Mrs. Appolloni a Gator fan but she is also a HUGE Tim Tebow fan - not that I am complaining about that because Tebow is a great role model for kids today. I want my children to like their teachers - it is good for many reasons - but this wonderful and amazing teacher played a major role in luring my sweet, innocent baby girl to the "dark side" of the SEC - becoming a Florida Gator fan! That said, Mrs. Appolloni was not entirely responsible for Audrey’s decision. Most kids in her class were Gator fans and Florida did have a great season last year. So there was a lot of peer pressure involved too. Audrey thought it was funny (and I did too at the time) that she liked the Gators and I liked the Crimson Tide. It was a running joke in our family until one dreadful Saturday in December, when the two teams met in Atlanta for a championship game and the joke lost its funniness. A huge loss for my team meant a huge win for her team. I swallowed a lot of pride and cheered on her Gator team as they played in the National Championship game (They are still an SEC team after all). She even received a Gator shirt for Christmas (I can’t stress enough how difficult that purchase was).

Now with the stage set again for another SEC showdown between my Crimson Tide and her Gators, the bet is on. So only time will tell if Audrey will be donning a fabulous “Bama” shirt or if I will have to wear the horrid orange and blue!

If you are one of those wondering how I could let this happen, then let me explain... It's actually quite simple - a mother's love for her children cannot be surpassed by anything... For more evidence of this, in relation to our inter-family rivialry, check out the blog post about Audrey's 8th birthday party - "Gator Style"