There is no need to rehash how drab this season has been.  Picking the scab left over from recent results would result in nothing but pus and bleeding.  On a personal note as a writer coming up with ideas. it has not always been particularly easy.  For me chiding the team and the manager week after week is a bit tedious and others can invariably do a better job at it.

My struggles as a writer and of the team on the pitch have never effected my love of the club or the game.  As I have noted previously, the life of an American Villain can be a bit of a lonely existence.  The news of the club’s impending US Tour gave Villans something to look forward to.  Our Facebook Group is up to 180 members and we are attempting to organize Villa supporters sections and meetups before the matches.  Living in the Boston area, Philadelphia is only a six hour drive away.  For a supporter that still hasn’t managed to make it to Villa Park, the idea that my club will be that close is almost mind blowing.

Liverpool will actually be training at Harvard University in Boston and playing AS Roma at iconic Fenway Park.  If training is open to the public, I might have to head down just to heckle Stewart Downing.  I jest I would never do such a thing. Would I?

Digressing it is that sense of community, that sense of belonging that is one of the reasons why our club will always mean so much to us.  It is one thing to buy a ticket in the Holte, ride a train or bus to an away match, or wake up at 8:00 AM on a Saturday with the previous night’s alcohol still in your system and try to find a dodgy stream.  The real reason why this means so much is the way football and our football club connects us to other people.

Football is also one of the few things in life that we can all count on.  We can’t count on positive results, but for 11 months out of the year there is a match of some kind going on.   Even in the close season there is endless talk and speculation about the upcoming season. No matter what goes on in our own lives the game is always there.

Having moved recently I have had the opportunity to go through junk I haven’t looked at in years.  Tonight after assembling a new bookcase and unpacking boxes I was reminded that things either happen or they don’t.  A lot of the time, we as people have a small window to make things happen or not.  We can make good decisions that we are happy with, or choose to be bitter about what could have been and be resigned to our lot in life.

Many of us became fans because, as kids, we aspired to be players.  At one point or another, competitive sport ends for all of us, and the window slams shut.  Whether it is cynicism, resignation, or acceptance, we as humans often reach a point where it feels that we are what we are.  A football club on the other hand has been around longer than all of us, and unless Craig Whyte or Sacha Gaydamak is involved, the club will be around long after we are all gone.  While in our lives opportunity can be fleeting, a football club starts every season with a clean slate, and has the ability to reinvent itself in a manner most of us either can’t or won’t in our own lives.

As far as this weekend is concerned I fear an in form Chelsea side will maul us in front of another indifferent Villa Park crowd.  I will be taking the game in with strangers in a meetup of Villa fans at The Banshee in Boston.  Hopefully there are more than three Villa fans there.  We will surely be outnumbered by glory-hunting Chelsea fans.

It goes without saying that in light of recent events, I send my best wishes and thoughts to Stan Petrov, and hope that this weekend can bring support in the crowd’s chants and, hopefully, three points to cheer our captain up. Get well soon Stan.

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