Last weekend was a perfect football weekend at Ole Miss. The sky was blue, the temperatures were a perfect 70 degrees and the game against Texas A&M was exciting down to the last play.
True, I didn’t go to college at Ole Miss but I feel like I did. My wife, sister, mother, father, mother-in-law, father-in-law, brother-in-law and sister-in-law all went to Ole Miss. I’ve been going to the Grove for 30 years.
My maternal grandfather, Bob “Baby” Buntin was the Ole Miss quarterback in 1918. He was all of five foot six inches tall.
My daughter Ruth is a junior at Ole Miss and absolutely loves it. She’s a Kappa Kappa Gamma. ( I hope I got that right.) Having been raised in Jackson her whole life, she feared that Ole Miss would be the same old same old, but it didn’t turn out that way. Ole Miss has a geographically diverse student body.
Having Ruth go in-state saved me a small fortune. I had to bribe her by agreeing to let her do summer study abroad. I also agreed to pay her rent the first year out of college. This was a very good deal for me.
In my defense to State fans, my grandfather Oliver Emmerich was a Mississippi State graduate as was my other brother-in-law. Some of my best friends went to State. And I always root for them except during the Egg Bowl.
It’s very impressive Ole Miss can beat a team that plays in a stadium twice the size of the one in Oxford. Texas has 10 times the population of Mississippi.
Truth be known, Ole Miss attracts a lot of Texas undergrads.
Unlike many Northsiders, I don’t have a pied-a-terre in Oxford. I want a second home about as much as I want a large boil on my neck. Fortunately, I have many friends who do have homes in Oxford and I have perfected mooching off of them.
In this case, my dear friend Aubrey Lucas came to my rescue. Unlike me, Aubrey has 12 homes. Twelve. And these aren’t rental homes. Obviously, he needs help.
Aubrey has been a dear friend since Greenwood days, five decades of friendship. House fetish aside, he is one of the smartest, funniest people I know. His dry wit is killer. And he is an outstanding hand surgeon here in Jackson. His wife Toni is beautiful and charming. They have two daughters Anne Fair and Charlotte who are great tennis players and super smart.
For my recent birthday, Aubrey framed a fake news article with the headline “Shocking unveiling of the Emmerverse. Tech world stunned by announcement from Jackson’s Wyatt Emmerich.” The article went on with numerous satirical paragraphs done in news style but alluding to private jokes. Well done.
During the weekend, the Lucas’ Oxford home on South Fifth Street was a continuing party with tons of friends dropping in to hang, eat some good food and watch a little football. Oxford is the capital of the Delta.
And what a game. It’s amazing that despite years of watching football, this complex game reveals something new every game. For instance, I have long known about the “personal foul” but now I know about the “flagrant personal foul.”
Apparently, the “flagrant” relates to the nature of the body part targeted by the irate Texas A&M player, who also made a glancing blow to the Ole Miss player’s head.
Small world story I heard. Hope it’s true. A friend was sitting near the parents of the attacked Ole Miss player, who stumbled and staggered after the blow. His dad said something like, “My boy ain’t hurt. He’s got a cup on.” Then the mother said, “Sure glad I paid for acting lessons.” The player, one of A&M’s best, was ejected from the game.
Then there was the “illegal touching” foul called against Ole Miss. (Seems like Ole Miss is not popular with the refs. They’re always getting fouls called against them.)
Illegal touching is in no way related to the “flagrant” personal foul. It involves ineligible receivers, such as offensive linemen, touching the ball before an eligible receiver does. It can also refer to a receiver who runs out of bounds and then comes back in to catch the ball..
I have spent so many years witnessing what I call “Ole Miss tragedy football,” it’s hard to believe we’ve got a team that actually rises to the occasion at the crucial moment. Let’s hope we can do the same against undefeated Georgia. Wouldn’t that be something. Stranger things have happened.
The Grove was hopping after the game. Ole Miss has this motto, “We may lose a game but we never lose a party.” Truly the Grove is the biggest, fanciest tailgate party in the world. It’s amazing to see that level of support.
I love just wandering around the Grove, people watching and running into friends. It never fails to happen.
We stepped into the bar at the Alumni House for a cold drink where I saw my good friend Glynn Griffing and his wife Nikki, who are in my Sunday school class.
Glynn was quarterback of Ole Miss’ only untied, undefeated team in 1962. As we talked, he bemoaned the fact that the riots of 1962 completely overshadowed his team’s perfect season. Nobody seemed to care about anything but the race riots.
Ironically, he saw James Meredith sitting alone at a table that very morning. “He just kept saying, ‘I failed,’” Glynn told me. James Meredith always had big ambitions.
On the way back, Ginny and I talked about all our blessings. How happy our lives have turned out.
To spend a perfectly beautiful weekend eating and drinking with friends and family with your greatest worry whether your team wins — now that is a great blessing.
