Dear Will:
On the morning of June 19, I shimmied into the too-small Team USA jersey Seth had given me. It was like a fat rat being swallowed headfirst by a pencil-thin snake. He and his friends then informed me that I would have to put flag tattoos on both cheeks and wear my too-ugly-to-be-seen-in-public patriotic running hat. This was not negotiable. It was still four hours before game time, and the excitement and anticipation inside our Airbnb was electric.
We walked a block to a diner for breakfast, entering too loudly and unapologetically. On our way to our table, we stopped to slap five with a group of bro’s dressed in matching red-white-and-blue overalls. “Where are you guys sitting?” we asked them. “Oh, we don’t have tickets,” they told us. “We’re just going downtown to one of the watch parties!” They seemed genuinely delighted.
After breakfast, we walked several blocks to the metro, Seth and his buddies adorned in red-white-and-blue sunnies and flag capes. Strangers honked and waved as we pumped our fists and answered back with “U-S-A! U-S-A!” As we made our way down into the underground, we hooted and hollered with others, anxiously awaiting a train to carry us into downtown Seattle. The first train to arrive was already packed with fans. It looked like 500 candy canes stuffed into a box made to hold 250. Everyone was smiling. The next train gathered us in, and once again we greeted and dapped up other fans adorned to similar excess. This was really happening. We were going to the World Cup!
The train unleashed us somewhere in downtown, but there was no question where we needed to go. Everywhere we looked, we could see rivulets of red, white, and blue Americans alongside smaller streams of yellow-and-green Australians. We waded in, eventually merging with a river of supporters, flowing toward Lumen Field. There were Americans dressed in revolutionary war garb, Aussies hoisting inflatable kangaroos, fans of every shape and size and ethnicity. We chanted, posed for pictures with inebriated rivals, wished the Aussies luck (but not too much luck) as we snaked our way toward the field. We were bouncing.
Inside the stadium, you could feel the tension and noise rising as 60,000+ people found their way to their seats. When the time came for the national anthem, everybody sang, poorly but beautifully, a full-throated tribute like you will never hear at a weeknight ballgame at your local ballpark. As the game began, we chanted and chanted and chanted, banged our hands and threw ourselves into our roles with full-bodied commitment. Those of us in the stands were determined to be a force.
Ten minutes in, the US team scored and the place exploded in euphoria. We hugged each other, double-slapped the guys behind us, teased a high-five from the kid one row up, felt the collective embrace of tens of thousands of others who were joining us in celebration throughout the stadium. When the second goal came, the reaction could only properly be measured with a Richter scale. (It was.) We all stood for the duration of the 90-minute contest, sitting only for hydration breaks (whatever it takes, right?). When at last the referee blew his whistle, signaling the end of a 2–0 USA victory, the boys and I high-fived it up with everyone around us and hollered at the top of our lungs. We remained standing, chanting, whooping, nobody but the Australians wanting to leave.
Then (strangely) someone cued the music: John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads.” I thought, John Denver? But hey, we won, didn’t we? So we joined right in. Some of us knew every word, but everyone knew the chorus. It was magical, unlike anything I have experienced. Even the players joined in. And in the moment, we were truly together, united, one nation under God, as the saying goes. No more red versus blue. Only red, white and blue. As it should be.
Tomorrow is our nation’s 250th birthday. I will (gladly and intentionally) avoid the “official” celebrations that have been co-opted and turned into political rallies which will, no doubt, highlight our differences and perceived grievances. Instead I’ll contort my way into that too-small shirt and throw on my ugly lucky hat. I’ll attend an early-morning flag raising ceremony in which a ragtag collection of sleepy Scouts will outdo anything a Marine Corps honor guard could ever hope to muster. I’ll pledge allegiance. I’ll sing (if my emotions let me) whatever patriotic hymns they serve up. After that, I’ll join with many of my favorite people on the planet for a pancake breakfast, an event I’ve been attending for almost 30 years. The flapjacks will be (let’s be honest) not that great. There will be crumbly scrambled eggs, imitation maple syrup, and margarine in a squeeze bottle. But the company will be unrivaled. The spirit of it all will be joyous, with an abundance of laughter and love. At some point I will reach for a breakfast sausage, either slightly undercooked or charred almost beyond recognition (there is rarely an in between), and I will look around me at the scene. It will feel so good, so familiar, so right, so true. Like coming home. To the place I belong.
Happy birthday, America. Go team!
PW
Photo by Tim Foster
Letters to Will 