Because It Matters

The Virginia Tech Hokies football team will be playing in the Sugar Bowl tonight. For the first time since 1964, one of their biggest fans will not be watching or listening to the game.
Richard Barker, my dad and a civil engineering professor for 30 years in Blacksburg, Virginia, died December 19 of pancreatic cancer.
As a youngster, dad and I would walk to football games and wait until halftime when they would let us in for free. We would sit in end zone seats (there were no sellouts in the early 60s) and watch the second half. Those early 60s teams, coached by Jerry Claiborne had Kenny Edwards, Terry Smoot, Frank Loria and Frank Beamer playing for them.
Dad was a quiet, reserved Swede, so it was hard to tell unless you knew him well how passionate he was about VPI (as Va. Tech was called then) football. Through years of losing seasons, dad persevered. Always loyal, always hopeful. But, as most longtime Hokie fans, also fatalistic. Hokie fans know success is fleeting and sometimes illusory.We spent too many years getting drubbed by SEC powerhouses like Alabama.
Because Blacksburg is not a large media market (don't think 30,000 residents qualifies) the national media has usually ignored or when they did pay attention, ridiculed the Gobblers We call ourselves the Hokies now and I suppose that's an improvement.

Dad followed this season with his usual keen interest. He was able to attend the first few home games in a wheelchair, but had to leave at halftime. By the time Homecoming came around (see picture) he wasn't able to attend, but stayed home and watched on TV.
Longtime Hokie fans get a lot of enjoyment in defeating in-state rival University of Virginia. Dad couldn't talk much on the phone by then, but he could text. Throughout the game, he texted. It was fun, the 38-0 drubbing was the Hokies' best showing of the year.
The next week against Clemson in the ACC championship, dad texted through the first half, but faded during halftime and fell asleep. I watched the whole second half in agony, watching the Hokies fall to Clemson just as badly as they had during the regular season. It was like they had learned nothing from earlier mistakes.
Around midnight, I got a text from dad. It was to be the last one he sent.
It said "Can you say out coached?"
He was ticked. He knew it would be the last Hokie game he would be a part of, that he wouldn't make it to the bowl game. Fitting that it would end for him the way many Hokie seasons have ended, losing a big game.
I told the story to a good friend of mine, who understood my dad's anger.
"He was upset," my wise friend said, "Because it does matter."
I will miss watching Hokie games with my dad, and getting texts from him during the game. Virginia Tech football is a big part of our lives together. If the Hokies lose big to Michigan tonight, he wouldn't be surprised. But he would still be ticked. Because it does matter.