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Monday, February 2. 2009
Tillman and Lollobrigida
That was the best Super Bowl in some time. No, the Cardinals didn’t win, but they made it a game and beat the spread. Kurt Warner proved he’s still a starting quarterback, but the Steelers proved they were the best team. Six Super Bowl championships; it’s an impressive record. Of course, the Green Bay Packers have eleven world championships, three of which are Super Bowls, but no one mentioned that when Al Michaels declared the Steelers the winningest NFL franchise, as if nothing that took place before 1967 counts. Well, it does count.
That wasn’t the only disappointment during the Super Bowl. Although there was a brief remembrance of one time Arizona Cardinal Pat Tillman in the pre-game hype — when most people are not watching — his name was not mentioned once during the game, when hundreds of millions of people would be watching.
The game, first and foremost, is about making money. The game on the field is just the hook to draw in the viewers who draw in the advertisers who paid $3 million dollars per 30-second spot. That’s nearly $400 million for the game, not to mention ticket sales, paraphernalia sales and all the ancillary income derived from featuring two sports teams vying for a championship.
That’s as it should be; this is America and free enterprise is the center of our national zeitgeist, maybe even our national religion. The hype and hoopla that precedes the game is what creates the expectation in the mind of not only fans, but also people who go to Super Bowl parties because it’s one of the most popular holidays on the calendar. Just about every American, whether they watch the game or not, is affected in some way by the Big Game, if only just to talk about it. The Super Bowl is the biggest sporting event in our lives.
But could it have hurt anything for the NFL to take a moment, after 6 p.m. Eastern Time, to honor a man who gave up his lucrative NFL career to serve his country, and in so doing, gave his Last Full Measure of Devotion? Apparently, for the NFL, it could.If Pat Tillman had made the choice just about everyone else of us would have made, to stay in the NFL and let some one else less fortunate go to Afghanistan (or Iraq), it’s likely he would have been in the Big Game Sunday. Instead, Pat Tillman chose principle and honor over money and comfort and set an example few, it seems, are interested in knowing, let alone following.
When we had a chance to prove we believed in something deeper than just a game, something bigger than vast wealth, we didn’t. Instead, the example set by #40, Pat Tillman, will be nothing more than just a footnote in NFL history.
The NFL does have a display honoring Tillman in the Hall of Fame, so they haven’t forgotten him, but it was his team in the Super Bowl and it would have been the right thing to do to honor him — during the game.
On CNN Monday, Rick Sanchez showed a video of a Washington, D.C. homeless man who was killed as the result of a street fight. The man lay on the street for 20 minutes before anyone called paramedics. In fact, the man’s head was lying across a curb, almost touching the wheel of a mini-van and the driver of that van moved the man before driving off.
The question Sanchez asked was, has America become so selfish and uncaring that we would let a man die in the street without helping him? Sadly, for most of us, that answer is “yes,” which is why there should be no surprise the NFL treated the memory of Pat Tillman so callously. I would bet we could gather all the Super Bowl viewers who are unhappy Tillman wasn’t memorialized during the Super Bowl and put them all in my small little living room.
Yesterday’s post made a rather brief mention of one-time sex symbol actress Gina Lollobrigida. There had been a bit more about the Italian bombshell, but because the blog went off on such a different tangent, the Gina portion was excised for use today.What got me writing about Gina Lollobrigida was seeing her in the 1956 film, Trapeze with Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis. So, being of prurient mind, I had to Google her and after reading a quote of hers from nine years ago, asked myself this question:
Can there ever be such a thing as true love? From Gina Lollobrigida’s 2000 interview in Parade magazine Gina refutes the notion somewhat: “I’ve had many lovers and still have romances. I am very spoiled. All my life, I’ve had too many admirers.”
It’s easy to see why. She was Hollywood’s hot bombshell in the 1950’s and ’60’s. Every man wanted her when I was just a wee lad. When she starred with Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis in Trapeze in the year I was born, she was 29. By the time I knew what “sexy” was the Italian girl was already a woman nearing 40, but a gorgeous woman nonetheless.
Lollobrigida went on to be a renowned photojournalist once her acting career dried up, although she did appear on the TV show, Falcon Crest in the 1980’s.
The subject of true love often comes up. Most people I know are married long before they reach my age — many of them at least twice. For decades now I’ve had a rather cynical view of love and marriage, except in those brief periods when I was in love. Then it was the best feeling in the world. But I always fell in love with women that were the source of pain and unhappiness. True love, for me, has always been a sappy marketing tool for sappy romantic comedies.
I’m with Gina Lollobrigida when it comes to love. I haven’t had too many admirers, but there have been enough lovers to give me a healthy skepticism about love and marriage. Still, there is always the chance — dare I call it hope? — that one person comes along to wash that all away.
Gina Lollobrigida is 81 now, born July 4, 1927 and she had too many admirers. I’m jealous. I’d like to have too many admirers.
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