Any Given Sunday

I am not an American citizen nor do I reside in the U.S. More importantly, I am not a sporty girl. I am all into health and fitness and going to the gym but anything that involves balls bouncing and flying in the air terrifies me. I always tend to run the other direction and avoid the ball as it has a tendency of always hitting me in any body part so I would rather do that than catch a ball passed to me and when I play badminton or tennis, it always seems like the net of the tennis racket has a hole since the ball always seems to fall on the floor. The only sport I think I am engaged in is running around and being able to jump about and do sprints in my 6-inch heels, which I must say is a skill most people don't get to master. The reason for this is probably because I am such a frail and fragile and dainty girl and I find myself silly whenever I run around and play sports. More so, my mom always discouraged aggressive playing and sports in general for fear that it might give us scars so she enrolled me and my sister in ballet classes (how much more girly and graceful can you be?) and more educational activities when it was summer time. I am however happy with how obsessed I am and challenged by going to the gym and lifting weights. I also love practicing Barre3 and am thinking of enrolling in individual pilates classes and Gyrotonic/Gyrokinesis classes. That pretty sums up my knowledge of sports: gym and fitness and training... Other than that, I have no knowledge at all. I do not know statistics, I never learned the rules of games and whenever my boyfriend (who is a sports fanatic) starts talking to my brother (another sports fanatic) about random players and games teams win, I seem to block whatever they are talking about and wander in my own world. I theorized that the extent of the their knowledge on teams and who is playing for them, the scores of games etc. might be similar to how fashion-obsessed girls like me know about designers, their most recent runway shows and looks and what the latest designer bag is and what brand it is. That probably applies to me, anyway as those are my interests. 


 

Football Jersey Sweater Dress: Zara | Leather Cap: Halves Clothing | Stacked Multiple Strand Necklace: Cultus ChiChi | Quilted 2.55 Jumbo Bag: Chanel | Leather Combat Boots with Studs: Zara

However, being the dutiful girlfriend I am (and I really am), I decided to accompany my boyfriend to watch the 48th NFL Super Bowl which was played by Seattle Sea Hawks and the Denver Broncos. Now I don't know anything about these teams and the extent of my knowledge of football is covered by the movies I watched like Any Given Sunday and The Replacements. But then, my boyfriend was all for watching it so I decided that since he accompanies me to my fashion events, I could at least try to be there and learn something new about something he likes. The fact that we immerse ourselves in each of our interests without having to force it on each other is kind of what makes our relationship a very nurturing one and I love that it is like that. I love going the extra mile (or in this case, another yard or two) and I believe so does he. I decided to take matters to my own hands and be creative so I can still merge fashion with football and since I was waking up at 5:30 to watch it LIVE at Bugsy's, I might as well do it in style and this explains this very sport ensemble. The occasion was actually quite perfect since I bought this sweater last November at Zara but never got to wear it yet so I saw that as an incentive to go and since I am too petite, I, as usual, wear my tops as dresses. I was quite proud of how I was able to merge my interest for fashion with my non-interest in football... it all balanced it out. And of course, to spice thing up a little bit more, I wore this studded pair of combat boots from Zara which I love and have quite the obsession with and finished the look of with a leather cap. I was quite proud of myself with how this look turned out and I had to pat myself on the back for the extra effort. 

However, as the game progressed, I found myself more and more immersed in the game and unlike basketball, which up to this day, I am still learning to understand... I understood American Football quite easily. And can I just say: the adrenaline rush of the plays executed and having these athletes pile all over each other for a ball is exhilarating and instead of being bored, I found myself actually interested and immersed in the game and actually cheering on every executed play, home run and turnover that was going on. I think an added bonus was that the team I was rooting for and bet for was winning the whole time which made the experience all the more delightful. My sister was tweeting me at that time and was quite surprised of how her little sister who ran away from Physical Education classes (I found a way to have myself exempted) was suddenly into the whole sport. She even went as far as asking me publicly via Twitter: "Who are you? What has Andrew turned you to?" Yeah, it was a surprise...for everyone else including myself that I enjoyed the experience as much as I did. 

Relating to men, apparently, if you try really hard is not that hard and I am glad that I was able to enjoy and share this experience and enlightenment with my boyfriend. I was thinking about it and one particular quotation came into mind, it was quoted from Marlo Thomas who said that "One of the things about equality is not just that you be treated equally to a man, but that you treat yourself equally to the way you treat a man." I know the modern woman is all about feminism and equality but I do sincerely believe that this ideology should not just swing in one direction. I think in light of recent events (with the scandal involving a local actor, a kept woman/ starlet and a known businessman/ gangster), this is a good one to consider. How do we treat men? I could not help but wonder. Do we treat them differently than we treat women? Do we treat them differently than we treat ourselves? And if so...how,when and WHY? I started asking myself about what I can learn about myself by taking time to stand outside myself and observe- really observe- the way I treated the men in my life or random strangers to see if there is any difference between the way I treat them, other women, and myself. Do I defer? Do I compete? Do I compare? Do I condescend? All of these are interesting and important questions I had to consider.

This is one of the most exciting things we can do in life: to become aware of something, gather some information about it, and use that information to move to a new level of growth and awareness before we are dismissive and decline that opportunity to discover something new. When we are too deep into ourselves and to our beliefs, we don't take the time for these gigantic leaps in growth and awareness. That Super Bowl Sunday (well Monday here in the Philippines), I realized that I have the opportunity to observe how I relate to men and to see if it differs from the way I relate to women and myself... Then I can see what comes next.

xx, JL

*****

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