A Snowy Football Game - Notes from the Sunshine State

Yesterday football fans witnessed a mini-lake effect blizzard during the NFL playoff game between the Cincinnati Bengals and the hosting Buffalo Bills.  The Bengals won 27-10.  Several people were commenting on the game on social media, and my mom was watching the game on TV on a snowy day in Ohio and texted me here in Florida.  “Great big flakes.  Must be very odd for anyone who has never been in snow to watch it.”  I bet it was.  Over the years I have watched a number of games played in the snow on TV, especially growing up as a Green Bay Packers fan.  Snow is nothing knew at Lambeau Field.

And who can forget the 1967 NFL Championship game between the Packers and the Dallas Cowboys at Green Bay on New Year’s Eve?  The Bengals - Bills game was a walk in the park compared to the infamous “Ice Bowl,” so called because of the brutally cold temperatures at game-time . . . 15 below zero with an average wind chill at −48 °F.  Still nearly 51,000 attended the game which Green Bay won 21-17.   An elderly spectator in the stands died from exposure during the game.  The officials were unable to use their whistles as they froze to their lips.  The late CBS commentator Frank Gifford even remarked during the game that he was going to take a bite of his coffee.  It had frozen solid in his mug. It was not the last frigid game to be played at Lambeau Field, but it is certainly the most infamous in the annals of NFL football.  

I have only attended one snowy football game . . . a memorable match-up between Notre Dame and Navy on November 4, 1967.   It was only my third college football game, the first being Bobby Dodd's Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets’ 14-6 victory over the Tulane Green Wave in Tech’s 1960 Homecoming Game at Grants Field, in Atlanta.  My dad had graduated from Tech ten years earlier.  Then there was the 1964 meeting between the Wisconsin Badgers and the Michigan State Spartans played before 67,000 fans at Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, Wisconsin.  That was back when the Badgers were the lapdog of the Big 10.  The Spartans won that one 23-6.

It was my junior year in high school and my dad and I left our home in suburban Chicago that Saturday morning for the roughly 120-mile trip to South Bend, Indiana.  We arrived at Notre Dame Stadium in time to walk around and enjoy some of the pre-game activities.  I purchased a copy of the game program featuring Jim Crowley, one of the famous 1924 Notre Dame “Four Horsemen” on the cover.  They were the Irish backfield that was key to Notre Dame going 10-0 and winning the national championship that season, the first of three under legendary coach Knute Rockne.   I still have it packed away in a chest.  It was a beautiful mid-autumn day, and it was shaping up to be a memorable game.  

The Fighting Irish of Notre Dame coached by “Era of Ara” Parseghian in his fourth season, and led by quarterback Terry Hanratty, Nick Eddy, star receiver Jim Seymour, and Larry Conjar, were the defending National NCAA champions having had the best scoring offense in the nation, with an average of 36 points per game.  The defense was second in the country in points allowed. The Navy Midshipmen were also 4-2.  The game was to be played before a sold-out crowd of just over 59,000.

The two teams might have shared similar records going into the game, but Notre Dame was dominant in ever respect.  The last time Navy had defeated the Irish was five years earlier.  The home team took the opening kickoff and marched it down field on the ground for 67 yards.  Team captain Bob “Rocky” Bleier punched the ball over the goal line for the first score.   Navy held its own and the first quarter ended in a 7-0 Notre Dame lead.  

Things quickly changed.  Notre Dame caught fire and Irish quarterback Hanratty let loose with an aerial bombardment to Jim Seymour for a total of 64 yard and a touchdown.  Three more unanswered scores and Notre Dame led 35-0 at the half.   The other change was the weather.  The pleasant autumn day quickly turned cold as the temperature dropped into the high 20s and it began to snow . . . hard.  The people sitting next to us had brought extra lap blankets and thankfully we had dressed in layers.  The hot chocolate sure tasted good.  And plenty hot!   At times the snow was so thick it was almost impossible to see the stands on the other side of the field.  The crowd began to chant “Ara, stop the snow!”  He was in control of his team on the field, but he had little to say about the weather.  

The weather certainly put a damper on the action in the third quarter.  There were also several delays while the grounds crew cleared snow off the field to see the yardage markers and the goal lines.  Navy quarterback John Cartwright ran for a short touchdown after the Middies recovered a Notre Dame fumble followed by a run for a two-point conversion and the score at the end of the third quarter was 35-8.   This was the first touchdown Navy had scored against Notre Dame since their defeat of the Irish in 1962.  The weather continued to deteriorate.   The Irish scored one more touchdown and two-point conversion in the fourth quarter.  Navy scored a second touchdown but failed on a two-point conversion run.   The game ended in an 43-14 Irish victory.  The Irish point total was the highest in the 41-year rivalry between these two teams dating back to 1927 and the seasons under coach Rockne.  That first game was played in Baltimore’s new Municipal Stadium and signaled the start of what is now one of the longest-lived intercollegiate football rivalries in the country.  Notre Dame won that first meeting 19-6.  

It was a memorable game indeed.  The Irish would go on to end the season 8-2 and ranked fifth in the nation in the AP poll.  Navy, under third year coach Bill Elias, ended its season with a disappointing 5–4–1 record.   

The snow had piled up during the game and instead of making the return trip to Chicago, we drove north 40 miles to my grandparents’ home in Decatur. Michigan waiting for the weather to improve.  The roads were clear the next morning.  That will be a game I will never forget.

Where the Brave Find Their Eternal Rest - Notes from the Sunshine State

              The patriot's blood is the seed of                                                               Freedom's tree.

        – Scottish poet Thomas Campbell

Each time I have returned to Florida for the past several years I always make a point of visiting the Florida National Cemetery, my father’s final place of rest near Bushnell, a small south Sumter County town.  Old soldiers do in fact die.  Dad 

passed away in October 2009 at the age of 85 and his memorial service at the cemetery took place the following April when his family and friends were able to gather in Florida.  I had never been to the Florida National Cemetery before that beautiful spring day, and I did not know what to expect.  The scrub back country of central Florida did not seem the appropriate place for a national cemetery.  I was amazed and impressed by what I found.  It is a majestic and solemn place as it should be for these brave souls who, regardless of who they were or where they came from, put their lives on the line to defend generations of Americans.  It is a quiet place interrupted only occasionally by the sharp report of an honor guard firing a final salute or the sad moan of Taps floating through the live oaks, dogwoods and palmettos and over the thousands upon thousands of marble headstones lined up in neat, seemingly endless rows.    

The Florida National Cemetery is located in the Withlacoochee State Forest, approximately 50 miles north of Tampa. The forest was acquired by the federal government from private landowners in the late 1930s, and the United States Forest Service managed the property until it was transferred to the Florida Board of Forestry in 1958.  It is the second-largest state forest in Florida.  In 1980, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced it would establish a fourth national cemetery in Florida (there are now nine) and the Withlacoochee site was supported by government officials.  The State of Florida sold the present tract of land to the VA in 1983 for the development of a Florida National Cemetery. The first internment took place in 1988.  Today it occupies 517 acres and contains the final resting place for over 131,000 veterans and their dependents.  Veterans from throughout the country and representing every major US conflict dating back to the Second Seminole War in Florida and the Civil War, are interred here.  With about 1,100 World War II veterans dying every day, and now with an ever-growing number of Korean War and Vietnam War veterans passing away, such final resting places are increasingly in demand, even though only about 15 percent of the nation's veterans choose to be buried in national cemeteries.  Florida National Cemetery is presently the second most active national cemetery in the country due in part to Florida, along with Arizona, being one of the country's top retirement destinations.  More than 7,000 internments take place annually – on average more than 20 funerals a day.  At this rate the Florida National Cemetery will reach full capacity of 180,000 interments by 2030.

All of these fact and figures fade into the background when I come to spend few minutes with my dad.  His ashes are entombed in one of the cemetery’s columbaria.  My uncle, a veteran of the Korean War, is in an adjacent columbarium.  Not too far away is the grave site of my dad’s best buddy during the war.  They were comrades in arms from Normandy, in the early autumn of 1944, until the Allied victory at the Battle of the Bulge in January 1945.  They would not see each other again for 50 years and today a once small-town lad from Michigan and one raised in Baltimore, find their eternal rest together.  Also nearby is the recent grave site of my wife’s maid of honor at our wedding, an early victim of the Covid-19 pandemic.  She was taken much too soon.  

These visits are always sad occasions.  How can they not be?  But they also afford an opportunity to be near family and friends who have gone before us. It somehow lessens the pain of grief.

Fried Green Tomatoes - Notes from the Sunshine State

One of the things we can always count on when we travel in Florida is a ready supply of fried green tomatoes.   It seems like just about every place that serves good southern cooking offers them in one iteration or another. 

Ripe green tomatoes are a very good source of vitamins A and C and potassium. They also contain iron, calcium, dietary fiber, magnesium, and other minerals.  Frying ripe green tomatoes (not the same as unripe red tomatoes) is the most popular way to cook them, and for good reason.  They are easy to slice then dredge in flour or corn meal after seasoning them with salt and pepper, and quickly fried on each side in shallow bacon fat.  If using cornmeal, the slice tomatoes are often dipped in milk or a beaten egg to help the cornmeal stick to the tomatoes while being fried.  It also allows the coating on the tomato to become thicker and less crunchy when compared to tomatoes cooked without a liquid wash.  The slightly sour flavor is balanced out with the crunchy fried batter.  Regardless of the manner in which they are served, the only other thing you need is a proper dipping sauce, and a Remoulade - rich, and a little spicy - is ideal and they often go with other dishes such as fried catfish, fried chicken, frogs legs, and cheese grits.  

Being a Midwestern lad, I had never even heard of fried green tomatoes until I lived in Florida while I was attending college, and then married a native Florida girl.  Which seems strange as the dish was brought to the US in the 19th century and was frequently served in New England and the Midwest.  The northern adaptations are more likely to use flour rather than corn meal. Their ready association with the South is more recent after the release of Fannie Flagg's 1987 novel Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café.  Flagg based the fictional Whistle Stop restaurant on the real-life Irondale Café in Irondale, Alabama formerly owned by her great-aunt.  The novel was followed by Fried Green Tomatoes, the 1991 film directed by Jon Avnet and based on the novel.  It was nominated for two Oscars at the 64th Academy Awards.

Regardless, I have learned to love fried green tomatoes and I enjoy them whenever and wherever we happen to find them.

When Your Luck Finally Runs Out - Notes from the Sunshine State

We are approaching the end of the third year of the COVID-19 pandemic which struck the United States and the world in March 2020.  Being in my early seventies, and suffering from an asthma- compromised respiratory system, a positive Covid-19 test for me during the pandemic carried with it an extra heavy weight.  According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], less than 15% of all reported cases in the US have been among people 65 and older although approximately half of all hospitalizations, and 75% of all deaths have been in this age group.  Hospitalization rate for seniors reached a record high last winter during the Omicron variant surge and then dropped significantly over the summer months. But compared with other age groups, hospitalization rates have consistently been higher among the 65 and older population.

My wife and I considered ourselves quite fortunate that we were able to stay healthy throughout the height of the coronavirus pandemic, a time when countless thousands were struck down, and many of whom ended up on ventilators in overworked hospitals.  And many of these victims died, their bodies warehoused in makeshift morgues.   We stayed closely quarantined at home during the earliest months, not leaving our house for weeks on end.  In 2020, and again in 2021, we chose not to make our annual summer-long escapes to the lake cottage in Maine, believing it was not wise to travel or to be far from our medical support.  Life as we knew it had changed and we wondered whether we would ever be able to return to some degree of normalcy. 

For a time this past summer it appeared to many, at least in the US, that life might be slowly returning to what it had been before as more and more Americans are fully vaccinated and boosted.  Like many others, after several months of home quarantine and only venturing into crowds fully masked, my wife and I gradually began to let down our guard once we had received the full program of vaccinations and booster injections.  We continued to wear masks when around crowds of people, but we were less cautious when interacting with friends and family who were also fully vaccinated and boosted.  Dire warnings were still there, but our attention to them had begun to wane.  

Over this past summer we finally began to travel and return to restaurants and other public venues which we had given a long arm’s distance during the early months of the pandemic.  We were exposed to individuals who shortly after encountering them tested positive for the coronavirus.  We immediately tested and the results remained negative.  We had, thankfully, dodged the bullet. 

With the onset of colder and damper weather, the coronavirus is once again on the rise across the country despite the fact that the population, in general, has an immunity wall built up against the Omicron variants.  Immunizations, boosters, and prior infections seems to be keeping younger folks healthy.  But the immune systems of people of advanced age are not as strong.  A recent survey from the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 60% of seniors were worried about a rise in Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations this winter – a far larger share than average.  Although the increase appears to be relatively mild and only a fraction of what it was during previous surges, older adults are still facing a far more serious situation similar to the peak from the Delta variant surge.   According to one health expert, “anyone can get this, but the older you are, the more likely you are to have severe symptoms, the more likely you are to be hospitalized, and the more likely you are to die.”  

This pandemic appears to be far from over as new variants are more immune-evasive and relatively low utilization of treatments like Paxlovid may have played a role in the rising hospitalization rate among seniors. The main culprit, however, is booster deficiency which indicates waning immunity.  If more seniors had their boosters the effect would be minimal.  The whole idea is to be proactive with all vaccines and boosters.  Even if you got sick, there was every good chance you would not end up in the hospital.  According to the CDC, only about a third of those over the age of 65 have updated immunization and boosters which is not very promising, if one is to be proactive. 

During the latter half of December my good luck finally ran out and I weathered the inconvenience of a long siege of Covid, testing positive for well over a week with a stuffy head, a hacking cough, and a constantly running nose.  I have no idea how or where I picked up the virus, but I was not over concerned.  I know many who have dealt with Covid to one degree or another, and I figured that even if I was positive, knowing I was vaccinated and fully boosted reassured me that I would weather this siege.  Then, a few days after I tested positive, my wife did too.  Her case was relatively mild compared to mine, but we kept our distance with me sequestered in the downstairs den with the TV and my books, and SallyAnn remained in our upstairs bedroom and studio (also with a TV and all of her projects close at hand).  We read and watched movies and we both completed the five-day Paxlovid cocktail and gradually saw improvement in our conditions.  That said, this year’s Christmas celebration was a complete wash as plans to gather with family and friends were cancelled, or at least postponed, until everyone was healthy again.

And now we are both finally testing negative for a few days, and we have left the chilly and damp north behind us, traveling to warmer climes . . . a small casita in the vicinity of Micanopy, about a half hour south of Gainesville, Florida which has long been our base of operations during visits to the Sunshine State.  Florida has always been a big part of my life having vacationed here for decades and having spent my undergraduate college years at Florida Southern College, if for no other reason that I was quickly growing tired of those tedious Midwestern winters.   It was here I met my wife of 48 years, a native Florida gal.  Many of us, including my younger self, think of Florida as a place of sun and fun, a place to escape to when life elsewhere in America has grown old and tiresome. Yet for the natives, Florida can become just as old and tiresome . . . just a place to be.  “Florida is a transient state in which too many rootless people dare nothing for the past nor this state’s future.” write Floridian writer Randy Wayne White in his novel Ten Thousand Island (2000).  “Florida is a vacation destination or a retirement place, as temporary as time spent in a bus station . . . Like a bus station, Florida attracts con men and predators.  It always has, Florida always will.”

Over the past five decades we have made countless trips down Interstate 95 from Washington, DC to points in northern and central Florida.  And it seems to me that Mr. White has captured the essence of what we have found.  In contrast to my college days here, Florida has become a much redder state than it was in the past.  Still, I try to look beyond this fact.  There is still so much I love about this place . . . perhaps the edgiest edge of America there is.  What better place to shake off the bug that bit us?

Perhaps this is not the best time to be traveling and we are taking extra precautions to minimize our contact with other people.  We mask up when we are out in public areas and avoiding restaurants unless we can eat alfresco.  The last thing we want is to weather another bout with the coronavirus.   We were lucky the first time around.  Maybe not so much should it strike again.  Don’t bet your life on it.  When in doubt, always mask up!!  

Wishing everyone a very happy, safe, and healthy New Year 2023!