I felt like crying too.

As heartbreaking as it was for the rest of us, and as much as I would like to move past the events of last Sunday, I must document the raw emotion that Evan felt as the Seahawks took their terrible Super Bowl loss.

We were all gathered around Jen's TV in her living room.  (She decided against buying the new TV just for the event and her old TV was projecting the game just fine).  We were decked out in our Super Fan gear - everything from newly purchased jerseys, to socks, to arm warmers, to wigs, and eye tattoos.  We were sweating, jumping up and down, sitting, standing, cursing, holding our hearts, and hoping.  Yes, hoping. 

As the game wore on, the kids were in and out of the living room.  They were playing football outside, riding shaky cars, playing hotwheels, building lego towers and checking in on the score every once in a while.  As long as the Seahawks were winning, Evan was able to keep playing.  His team was doing exactly what he thought they would and each time I told him we were winning a smiley little face would zoom away to report the score to the others.  

However... yes, you all know how the story plays out.  We were winning, at some point.  We were so close!  We had that amazing catch and we were on the whatever yard line ready to score with 20 seconds left on the clock.  Evan had stopped playing and had joined us in the living room.  He was staring at the TV in disbelief.  What did I mean they were losing?  What was happening?  "Mom, they need to score!" "Mom, can they kick a field goal?"  "Mom, what if there is a penalty by the other team?  Will we get more time?"  And then, just like that, the game was over.  No, Lynch didn't punch it over the goal line.  No, Wilson didn't do a sneaky move to run it in for a touchdown.  The Patriots had the ball and the game was over. 

As we picked up our broken hearts and tried to gather our strength, I started to walk up Jen's stairs and heard this little crying sound coming from behind me.  I turned around to see Evan crying.  He was crying the type of cry that you try to hold back, but simply can't.  You know, the type of cry that only gets worse when someone acknowledges that you are actually crying or when you see someone that you love that might try to comfort you.  I looked at his little face and was panicked.  "Evan, what happened?  Are you hurt?!"  He started SOBBING and through his little tears he simply said, "I am just so sad that the Seahawks lost!"  Oh buddy!  Me too!

In hindsight, I think he might have been the biggest Super Fan of all of us. He had complete faith that they would win and could barely comprehend the fact that they hadn't!  The next morning he woke up and came down the stairs.  The loss was still fresh in his mind as he laid down on a big pile of blankets, starred blankly into space and said, "Mom, why didn't they give the ball to Lynch?"

It will be a long season if all my promises of seeing them play in the Super Bowl next year don't pan out.  Hopefully we can redeem ourselves and maybe next year we can get that big 12th man win we were all hoping for.