{"id":35841,"date":"2022-06-04T00:10:52","date_gmt":"2022-06-04T07:10:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=35841"},"modified":"2026-06-06T07:17:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-06T07:17:12","slug":"sports-fan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/sports-fan\/","title":{"rendered":"Jon Was a Sports Fan. Am I?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"san-francisco-chronicle-sports-fan-page\"<\/a>
The San Francisco Chronicle promoted the NBA finals with a splashy cover on its sports section. It got my attention. Jon would tune in to the NBA finals if his team was playing. But would I?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Jon loved sports. I didn’t. But I did love Jon. And so, early on, I saw that if I was to win the heart of Jon, the sports fan, I’d have to put some of my own heart into sports in general, and Jon’s teams in particular.<\/p>\n

The baseball Giants, the football 49ers, the basketball Warriors — those were Jon’s teams, and eventually they became mine.<\/p>\n

I don’t love sports, but I do like them. I like watching the Giants, the Niners and the Warriors. That is, I liked — past tense — watching those teams if Jon was right there with me, in front of the TV, his recliner across from mine, giving me a running commentary of the game as it went along.<\/p>\n

Watching sports was fun — as long as Jon was there.<\/p>\n

The Widow’s Life\u00a0<\/strong><\/h5>\n

But now, like it or not, a new life awaits me, a life without Jon to accompany me to weddings and retirement parties — and into the den to watch the Giants on TV.<\/p>\n

What will fill my life now that I’m free to do pretty much anything I want?<\/p>\n

\"steph-curry<\/a>
Steph Curry in the fourth quarter of the 2022 NBA finals, as the Warriors began to lose ground to the Celtics.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The kids are grown. The house is mostly paid for. I don’t have to consider a husband’s idiosyncrasies. I can take that trip to Michilimackinac<\/a>. I can track down my ancestors in Amsterdam.<\/p>\n

I could sell the house and buy one closer to the grandchildren. I could move into an age 55-and-up community and take up golf. I could join a garden club, a hiking club. Another book club. I could sign up for my college alumni association.<\/p>\n

I could be a sports fan.<\/p>\n

The Warriors Make It to the NBA Finals<\/strong><\/h5>\n

The question came to a head two days ago. The NBA finals were about to begin. The Warriors were meeting the Boston Celtics in San Francisco. The local paper had the news splashed all over the front cover of its sports section. I couldn’t miss it.<\/p>\n

I had to ask myself. Am I sports fan. Or not? Do I care enough to sit down and watch this game?\u00a0Are the Warriors my team? Or Jon’s?<\/p>\n

There was only one way to find out — watch the game.<\/p>\n

I did. With dreadful results. My team lost.<\/p>\n

Now what to do? Watch another three, four, five, six, seven finals games? I don’t think so.<\/p>\n

I hope the Warriors win the championship. I do. They’re my team. But, honestly, it’s just not that much fun watching them by myself.<\/p>\n

More about Jon and sports at “My Guys Are Talking Football and All Is Right With the World.”<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\"black-leather-recliner<\/a>
There’s nobody sitting in Jon’s recliner these days. Photos by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"steph-curry<\/a><\/p>\n

Jon loved sports. I didn’t. But I did love Jon, and he was a sports fan, so I followed his teams. Now that he’s gone, am I still a sports fan? Read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":49249,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,14],"tags":[34,29,2604,2605,2606],"class_list":["post-35841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-a-case-of-the-human-condition","category-widowed","tag-dont-miss","tag-jon","tag-nba","tag-sports-fans","tag-warriors"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35841"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35841\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49252,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35841\/revisions\/49252"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}