Friday, March 16, 2012

Red at Night, Sailor’s Delight

An Open Letter to TFC

My dearest Toronto FC:

We need to talk. I’ve been doing some thinking over the last few days and I think we need a structural change in our relationship.

Now calm down, don’t start crying. I don’t want to break up, nor do I don’t want to go on a break (and we’re already in an open relationship), however, we need to sit down and re-think our roles and duties in this partnership. I still love you, but I’ve changed.

You see, over the last 5 years, I had patience, I was forgiving; I was making excusing for us and enabling your bad behaviour. But I see now that I was in the wrong, I was damaging us.

When you’d lose, I’d positively say, “don’t worry, we’ll get them next game!” I turned a blind eye and it seemed like I couldn’t care less what you did.

Well, not anymore.

I realized something during the previous CCL round, for the first time ever, my dearest TFC, I actually got pissed off at you. You actually filled me with rage.

YOU IDIOTS! WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU? WHO THE FUCK DRAWS 2 – 2 WHEN YOU’RE UP 2 – 0 AT HOME?!

Well, the short answer is Udinese. And if Udinese ever pulled that stunt on me, I would be raging, not celebrating. Thinking back now, it is insane that I walked out of that game relieved, happy, and hopefully. You see, my dearest TFC, here’s where you differ from my first love.

People ask me how I can be so hard on Udinese, but the real question is, how can they be so hard on me? How can they win a game, and yet still be kicked out of a European competition? (Note: that’s a rhetorical question, I do understand the rules).

The truth is, I am hard on Udinese because I love them. I want them to do better because I know they can. I get angry with them when they don’t because I know they are able to. You see folks, my rage, anger, verbal abuse, and tears are all just signs of love (just ask anyone who’s ever dated me).

It all boils down to one thing: passion. I am like this because I am passionate. I can get so angry that I actually start to shake. But, I can also get so excited that it results the same reaction.

You see, I believe that you can only really love something as much as you can hate it. That said, love and hate do not necessarily have to have the positive and negative connotations we usually attribute to them; rather, we should view them as extreme acts of passion.

And that’s where I have failed you TFC; you have only gotten the love, which is completely phony, hollow, and, quite frankly, shallow without the hate.

It’s not real love without the hate, you need both to truly support a team. You cannot possibly understand what it means to be truly happy, unless you also know what it means to be truly gutted. It’s not the ability to go from one extreme to the other, it’s the ability to understand why it’s necessary to go from one extreme to another.

So, my dearest TFC, we will approach this season with a new outlook. I will hate you, scream at you, and threaten you with the North American equivalent of Serie B (fun fact: there isn’t one), because I love you. And because I will never give up on you.

 All for one.

Hopp,
scm. 

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