Let’s go Tigers, soar like eagles, go and get dem’ gator peoples !!

WAR EAGLE !!

I wrote the post below back in 2009, my first football season without Gregory and what I didn’t know would be my last with my Daddy.

Since then, our Saints won the Super Bowl and our Auburn Tigers became National Champions. To non football fans, these aren’t important things, but to us, they are part of the rhythm of our lives.

Tomorrow, I am going back to Auburn to watch my Tigers play.

Our opponent?

Mississippi State.

G and I started our journey into crazy love at an Auburn – MSU game.

I can hardly wait to get to the loveliest village on the plains.

It seems appropriate and it makes me smile.

War Damn Eagle.

Auburn football begins today.

Another chapter in my life I will have to go through without him.

Our first date happened at Auburn. Our first kiss.

Our favorite place to hang out started at Auburn’s Mellow Mushroom and led us to so many more.

The first picture we ever took together.

This one.

The goofy grin on his face as he waved at me all the way down (and up) the stairs….

The first time we goofed off with Dr. Bill (who ironically, I used to call Dr. Lecter….he used to bring me a wildflower every game and say “Hello Clarice”) as a couple…

Chilling at home watching the away games………

Good times with friends….

Meeting Coach Dye….Tiger Walk…rolling Toomer’s corner….the Shelby County Auburn Club…SEC days….lazy Saturdays watching football and grilling out all day…the traditions and things that made us an Auburn family……..Patrick Murphy Mann included……

We went to see the President there…..

I’ll go back to Auburn I know. It was a part of me long before I even knew G, but he just made it a better part. I am going to try and go next weekend. It’s the Mississippi State game. That game, 6 years ago, was our first date. So it’s gonna be tough.

But I’ll go and be surrounded by friends. I’ll sing “Budda Getta” and scream “It’s great to be an Auburn Tiger” and yell out the fight songs and hug Aubie on Tiger Walk and buy a game shirt and do all of the things we did in what seems like a lifetime ago.

I might not go to Mellow Mushroom, not just yet. And I probably won’t do many of the things that he and I did in our Auburn game weekend routine.

But I’ll do some new things. I’ll make my own traditions. Auburn will always be my home. And I know you’ll be watching over me, soaring above me like Tiger and Spirit do before the game.

War Eagle Baby . I love you.

**UPDATE  @0944am – Harvey Almorn Updyke has been arrested for the crime and more details are upcoming. Hope he likes that ORANGE jumpsuit.**

**UPDATE 2 – If this doesn’t prove the guy is totally insane , read this …….. Barnes said he and Updyke attended Alabama’s BCS national championship win over Texas in the Rose Bowl at the end of the 2009 season. He also said two of Updyke’s children are Crimson Tyde Updyke and Bear Bryant Updyke. Barnes said he wanted to name another child Ally Bama Updyke, but her mother wouldn’t let him.**

Today I am sickened by the actions of an individual who shares this state with me. I don’t know this person, nor do I want to, but he has made himself known to myself and the rest of the Auburn Family by his despicable act .

This person poisoned the 130 year old oaks at Toomer’s Corner. Purposefully. And then he called a local sportscaster’s radio show and BRAGGED about it. And right before he hung up, he proudly declared “Roll Damn Tide.” Now I’m no brain surgeon, but I know that is not the battle cry of an Auburn fan. It is the spirit cry of the University of Alabama, our in-state rival and fellow SEC team.

There are many good Alabama fans. This SOB is not one of them.

People across Alabama, fans of both teams, have lit message boards and blog comments on fire with their own opinions. Most are overwhelmingly positive and in favor of finding and punishing the person that did this, and then of course there are the usual trolls who weigh in with their childish comments and stabs at what they stupidly call “cow college”. Some Alabama fans have compared it to when an Auburn jersey was put on the statue of Bear Bryant prior to the Iron Bowl last year. Uh, WTF ? Sorry, that’s like comparing, oh, divorce and death ? That was a harmless joke, the jersey was removed without damage to the statue or anything around it. This was a malicious act that will permanently damage those trees and the soil around them, possibly preventing anything else from ever growing there. Comparing the two is laughable.

These aren’t just trees. They are icons. They are symbols of our university. They represent the strength of our students, our alumni, our scholars and athletes. After every win or Auburn event they are rolled in toilet paper, a celebration known as “rolling Toomer’s corner.” The Auburn family knows that Toomer’s is THE gathering point when anything, good or bad, happens. Even tonight, as the news was breaking, people gathered among the oaks.

The oaks at Toomer’s are a huge part of our Auburn family, our traditions, our history. And of mine.

I hope a miracle happens and they are a part of it for the next 130 years.

War Eagle.