Roll Tide Meets Go Hoosiers: Send Help
| The truth is I didn’t know what to expect. I thought — and confidentially, I hoped — that college football was behind me. Ever since I was growing up in Birmingham, AL, I was the oddball among my friends and family — the girl who had no interest in college football, never greeted people with “Roll Tide,” and wouldn’t recognize Nick Saban if I saw him walking down the street. So, you can imagine how excited I was to land in Indianapolis where college football, with its all-consuming intensity and unswerving loyalty to state teams, would be behind me once and for all. Well…I was wrong. Who knew that my husband, Jamil, a rabid Alabama Crimson Tide fan if there ever was one, our son, Max, and I would wind up in our adopted city as the Indiana Hoosiers were emerging as a national football powerhouse. And please don’t tell my Alabama friends (or family) that I, who didn’t even understand the rules of football am considering becoming a fan. Strange. But I have thought about it and here’s why. It’s because in Indianapolis, I get the sense that our sports teams, no matter how they fare, belong to everybody and gift us with a sense of community pride. Somehow, which will be astonishing to anyone who knew me in the old days, I’ve become attuned to the Hoosiers, Colts, Pacers, Fever and Boilermakers. The teams feel like a part of the fabric and culture of Indy and, frankly, our JCC. In many ways, they are. We’ve had some of Indianapolis’ top professional athletes work out at our JCC and put on clinics. Just this week, a former Pacers star stopped by to watch the opening practice of youth basketball. Our Indy teams for sure have provided our members with some of the coolest swag. Yet, it’s more than that. I think people care about our teams because what I have especially come to love about Indianapolis, is that people care about people. This became evident the day I landed in Indianapolis for the CEO interview process. One of our community members gave me a wonderful welcome, embracing me with what she called a “Hoosier Hug.” Now, in all fairness, we do have premier football in Alabama. And in other sports as well, as reflected in the reputations that the University of Alabama and Auburn University have developed as basketball schools. (Yes, I know that #2 Purdue beat #8 Alabama in men’s basketball just last night.) Yet, growing up in Alabama we didn’t have major league sports and, I have come to see, having such teams creates a whole new energy level in a community; a camaraderie and cohesion that reaches across income levels, zip codes, religions, and racial and ethnic diversity — uniting us all around our favorite teams. Why I am so aware of this is because this also is the very essence of our Jewish Community Center: We are a connector. We create the same energy and camaraderie described above. We are a place where we care about one another, purposefully and passionately, regardless of who is wearing what team sweatshirt on what day. As I finish writing this Shabbat message, I must confess that I am truly astonished that I am writing about sports. Yet, what I am really writing about is life. The magic of people coming together around common goals and those common goals — and successes — bringing people together. I love the work I am doing and the people I am doing it with. The only thing I am truly worried about these days is what it will be like in my household, and those households of friends and family back in Alabama, if the Crimson Tide and Hoosiers wind up playing each other in the college football playoffs. If that’s the case, I think I’ll go back to being the woman from Alabama who doesn’t care about sports. |
| Shabbat Shalom, |
| Sam Dubrinsky, CEO |