Stalking football players is all about love
Marlayna Soenneker
Here We Go Again
I've never been one of those girls who fixates on athletes. I'd say the closest I've ever come was a reasonably strong desire to meet Joey Getherall last year because I was so amused by the fact that he was 5-foot-8 or something and played college football. I'm 5-foot-1, so I have a special place in my heart for short guys.
Overall, I've just never been that into the football team as guys are. I'm glad they are, but I'm not out to date them. I've heard girls joke about trying to date all the football players, but if I was going to pick a group of guys to date all of, I'd probably pick the Glee Club. Guys who sing, that's for me.
Nevertheless, I'm aware that I'm a very small minority (it's pretty much just me) when it comes to appreciating men who sing. Most women are all about athletic guys. In fact, there's a particular football player on campus — we'll call him, oh, how about "Bocky," a purely fictional name — who seems to have inspired quite a female following.
I know two girls, one junior and one freshman, who are fixated on Bocky. Last year, the junior, Marie, was completely terrified of Bocky. He's sort of big, as most football players are, and bears a striking resemblance to a certain group of ancient warriors, who may or may not be the Vikings.
She spent the first half of the season last year terrified of our Bocky. She'd tell me every time she saw him, along with a description of the abject terror she had felt. But somehow, as happens to so many people, her terror morphed into a strong desire to marry Bocky and bear his children.
In about three days she went from a strong desire to run whenever she saw Bocky to a strong desire to invite him back to her room. This led to a number of strange behaviors on her part.
A possible example may be that one of the Irish Insiders last year may have had Bocky on the front, which may have led to her creating Bocky shrines, one inside and one outside her room.
This was sort of interesting, because Bocky's girlfriend at the time may have lived in the same dorm she did, leading Marie to fervently pray she would never walk by her shrine. How exactly does one explain that to an irritated girlfriend?
This also led to a disruption in our timing for dinner. The football team ate dinner at 6:45 p.m. last year, I think, which meant we had to, too. This, of course, was to increase the likelihood of a Bocky sighting for the day, a ploy which was usually successful. Plus, we got to find out every day what Bocky was having for dinner, and if that's not interesting, then what is?
It's particularly fun when Marie eats dinner at the same time as the football players but with people other than me. I'm used to rearranging my life around Bocky, but other people are generally less so. The other day, Marie met a nice new boy at dinner with friends.
She then proceeded to force him to switch her places at the table so she'd have a better view of Bocky. Then Bocky went to get some ice cream, and Marie forced this nice, new boy to escort her to the ice cream machine. She did this solely to be near Bocky, and she didn't actually get any ice cream. This nice new boy thinks she's crazy.
My freshman friend with the Bocky obsession this year appears to have read the same "How to Stalk Football Players" book that my friend Marie did. She knows not only when the football players eat dinner, but also when and where Bocky eats lunch.
She has a collection of Bocky pictures in her room. She also knows a guy who went to high school with Bocky. She swears that she's not friends with this guy simply because he vaguely knows Bocky, but she will admit that it was the reason she got to know him.
My two friends haven't met yet, but I told them about each other. Marie, smiling but with steel in her eyes, instructed me to tell my freshman friend that she was welcome to appreciate Bocky, but that she, Marie, would beat her up is she tried to take Bocky from her.
My freshman friend responded that she could take Marie. They both laugh, of course, but their eyes are not amused. I'd suggest they start a fan club, but I think it would just lead to physical violence, which wouldn't be right at all. While football's supposed to be about physical violence, stalking football players is all about love.
Marlayna Soenneker is a junior psychology major. Marlayna would like to assure "Bocky" that neither of her friends is at all dangerous in any way. Her column appears every other Thursday. She can be reached at msoennek@nd.edu.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
All Viewpoint Stories for Thursday, November 1, 2001
