Except for steak, which should always be enjoyed cooked medium or pinker (NO EXCEPTIONS), there are no rules to enjoying things. If you like something — or if you don’t — it’s okay. Variety is the spice of life, and there’s no timeline to introductions to life’s smörgåsbords. We’re human beings living in a snappy world full of technology that sticks fun’n’fresh things in our faces all the time, and I will be damned if I let one of you ashy boys and girls call me a bandwagoner for liking something new ever again.
I do not know much about baseball, soccer, basketball or most other sports. I was not an athletic child. I learned to read when I was three, and spent the two years before kindergarten jumping on my bed in my room watching Steve and Blue and picking up deductive reasoning skills.
Academia shaped my preferences for competitive extracurricular activities in middle school and high school. While some of y’all were scraped up on the playground playing tag, I was chilling on the sidelines getting racks on racks of Accelerated Reader points. When kids were trying out for basketball, softball, track and cheerleading, I was happily minding my business in the Quiz Bowl, Forensics and Academic Decathlon corners, and trying to win the National Spelling Bee. I lost, by the way; I wasn’t nearly home-schooled enough to have a shot at the number one nerd spot in Washington, D.C.
Luckily, I adopted new interests and was face to face with things I didn’t quite experience before in high school, like a flourishing athletics department and a preexisting fan base with an irresistible way of drawing you into showing your school spirit. It’s fun as hell to get behind our teams and support them. They deserve it. And maybe I haven’t cared about baseball before in my life, but I get a Fast Pass to enthusiasm about it today, sis, because I am an Ole Miss student and I am entitled to the opportunity to support my classmates, whether or not I decided to subject my hair and clothes to beer showers all during regular season.
The same sentiments go for soccer. As witty as you think you are making dry comments about people’s excitement for the World Cup and their newfound enthusiasm for soccer, please let me be the first to let you know that you need to have several seats.
The World Cup is a global celebration of an extremely popular sport and is accompanied by this almost tangible fervor. How could you not be excited for it? Why wouldn’t someone who’s never watched soccer before decide to experience something new and fun, and watch the games? Should people have to stand on the wall during this worldwide party just because someone who played soccer in high school says they’re not a real fan? Of course not. Stop being the fun police, and just let people like things — God forbid people get the opportunity to broaden their horizons and enjoy a passion shared by about 80 percent of the rest of the human population.
Lively up your selves and try to be likable. I haven’t been a lifelong soccer fan at all, but as for me and my 18-inch Brazilian bundles, we will be praying for Júlio César’s steady heart and hands in the match against Mexico tomorrow, regardless of how you might feel about it.
It doesn’t matter whether or not you decided to like the Miami Heat, a musical group, Apple products, or anybody or anything else yesterday or ten years ago. It doesn’t matter whether or not you like it “just because everyone else does.” While you live in this world, you should access every part of it that you can. Life is too short for letting the fun police infest your mentions and limit your enjoyment of anything that you like, especially if you’re not hurting anyone.
Try new things. Participate in fun cultural celebrations without appropriating them.
Do you.
Sierra Mannie is a classics major from Ridgeland.
