Pray for victory.

What's so special about a tailgate? And why did 50M Americans do it last year?

Two Saturdays ago I woke up early and boarded a 7am Amtrak from Newark, NJ to Baltimore Penn Station to experience an NFL tailgate for the Wild Card round between the Baltimore Ravens and the Pittsburgh Steelers; a heated rivalry in bitter conditions with temperatures hanging around 25ºF and humbling gusts of wind reaching 30 mph. With kickoff slated for 8pm, I was there, bundled, ready to witness the flocking of Ravens fans to Lot H at M&T Bank Stadium right as the “doors” opened four and half hours before gametime. FOUR AND A HALF HOURS BEFORE, plus three hours at the game! We’re quickly encroaching on the same time commitment as watching The Lord of the Rings Trilogy back-to-back-to-back, but in this case standing outside, presumably eating and drinking, not storming the gates of Mordor. 

Why would anyone subject themselves to this? This sounds pretty miserable. Yet, fans waited even longer to be first in line to enter the barren salt-dusted parking lot with their retrofitted RV’s, pick-up trucks, school buses, and yes, a converted ambulance. My short answer as to why…community. It’s a ritual where people feel connected. It’s also a rare confluence of classes unencumbered by access. It’s a freaking parking lot. No security checkpoint or metal detector. You can just waltz right in with a propane tank on your shoulder. The tailgate is not glamorous, not pretentious and is completely nonsensical. But I think that's kind of the point. It’s a release for people. It’s a place where they have the freedom to let go and be a little featherbrained. Community has dwindled in America, or maybe it’s transformed in an unrecognizable way, but the NFL has undoubtedly commandeered Sundays and as the population drifts from the pews to the parking lots, this ritual of congregating allows so many folks the opportunity to share in something. That something, however, is whatever they want it to be– a memorial for an old friend, a few hours shared between a father and son, or a rave under an overpass. The tailgate in many ways offers sacred time for people to be together outside the confines of normal life, outside the threat of judgement, and actually outside. To me, the outcome of the game is secondary and the shared experience is the meaningful takeaway. For a few hours we forget our troubles, look optimistically towards the future, and pray for victory. 

I wonder how many tailgaters are religious and what they do to fill this void when the season is over? An interesting segue as I turn my attention towards religion, faith, and worship. 

Photographed on 35mm film.     

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