World Cup Travelogue# 3 : Something can always go wrong

“What time was our slot on the bus from the parking lot?”

“5:30. We’re good,” I said. “As long as we’re there before the bus leaves, we’ll be fine.” We’d left the house early, and grabbed a quick dinner at Chick-fil-A. Our destination was the designated parking spot where we could catch a bus to the stadium for the game.

Argentina vs. Algeria — Lionel Messi, the greatest. The World Cup, the planetary pinnacle of sporting events. I’d gotten tickets at face value in the lottery, and was blessed with only having to take out a HELOC to afford them rather than a second mortgage.

“Our tickets are Row 1 of Section 331 but surely that’s not the front of the upper deck right?” I said. “I’m assuming those were premium and we’re like the front of the nose bleeds.”

“Probably,” he said checking the ETA on his phone again.

“What’s the greatest sports moment you’ve seen in person?” I asked him, as we merged onto 435.

“Probably that Sporting KC playoff game in 2018,” he said.

I remembered that one, I was working for the team while Sam was in the crowd. We’d scored a last second goal to seal it and I felt like the roar of the crowd crashed like a wave onto the field, but it was one of those waves you weren’t prepared for, and it knocked you flat into the sand. Sam and I had probably met up after the game and talked about it for hours.

“What about you?” he asked.

I need you all to understand something about me: when it comes to experiences at sporting events, I’m cataclysmically selfish. Because when Sam asked me that question, my first thought was how bitter I was about not getting to go to the 2022 Tennessee-Alabama game.

I didn’t even try to get tickets to that game, but when Tennessee won, I celebrated for 20 minutes before my skin turned green and my eyes went yellow, and I should have deleted Instagram before seeing everyone who got to be there while I watched on TV.

I felt a similar feeling when I’d applied for the World Cup tickets. This would be the greatest sporting event in our country in my lifetime, and they were playing games in Kansas City — a city where I spent 2.5 years working in the sport and telling the game’s story. This is why the few fingers I had to sever, freeze, and mail to FIFA for the tickets didn’t feel like a bad purchase.

But in the days before the trip, I worried about what guaranteed calamity would take this away from me: what if I get food poisoning before the trip? What if I miss my flight? Or what if I am so anxious about missing my flight that I don’t sleep well, and then I’m exhausted because now I’m 34 and a bad night’s sleep can reduce me to the equivalent of a slug looking for a Starbucks? And what if I get a jalapeno chicken pocket at Starbucks and it gives me food poisoning?

Properly cooked chicken pockets, iPhone alarms, a nap at Sam’s place, and the grace of God had gotten me through all of those hurdles. But now, another:

“Our ETA says 5:34,” said Sam.

“Our bus leaves at 5:30.”

“Well, that’s not good.”

“Yeah.”

Sam’s and my friendship is one of restrained feelings. We grew up in a world that told boys to “keep them feelings to yourself unless it’s a moderate happiness about things.” It’s great for situations like this where one person panicking could bring the whole thing down. But it also means instead of saying “Hey, I love you, man” after hanging out, we’ll say something like “That was fun, thanks for the invite.”

We pulled into our parking lot at a church 2 miles south of the stadium, and I saw a line of humanity. If you emptied the Magic Kingdom into a parking lot, I think there’d still be more people zig-zagging across the asphalt waiting to get on a bus.

Sam didn’t believe at first: “Surely that’s for something else.” I’d spent the last month assuming I’d get food poisoning, so I knew that was our line.

The game was two hours away, but we were 2 miles away. Plus, this is the World Cup, I was assuming we’d have to get Pentagon clearance before we were let into the stadium. And this was the first Kansas City game, you know, the one where they realize the ticket scanners aren’t as fast as they thought and half the crowd ends up hearing the first half from the line in the parking lot (and if that happened, that would surely be the moment I’d realize I have food poisoning).

Sam was pacing in the parking lot, checking his phone to see what the bus pass said, and speaking really fast.

“We could just walk,” I said. I wanted to pace and talk fast too, but only one person is allowed to panic.

We watched the line for a few minutes — it didn’t move.

“Let’s walk,” Sam said.

We joined a group of Algeria fans all in green, some draped in their green and white flag with a red crescent and star in the center. They were laughing, smiling, singing, and amassing an energy with them that was dancing up the road towards the stadium. I saw a group of guys whose cheeks must have been sore the next day because of how much fun they were having, dancing and singing together.

“Did we make the right call?” I said, as 5 buses bound for our lot passed us.

“I think so,” said Sam.

Now some Argentine fans had caught us. They were singing as well, but the singing was more organized as if they had the Argentine Soccer Hymnal and were singing “#331! Muchachos, Ahora Nos Volvimos a Ilusionar!”

Our vision turned into a motion blur of sky blue and a white so shiny and elegant, you’d think it was cut from a wedding dress.

“I guess for me the best moment I saw was Tennessee in the National Championship in 1998,” I said as we walked through some high grass on the side of the road near a Dollar General.

“You were there?”

“Yeah, I was. But I was 7, I only remember a play or two.”

Some Algeria fans were singing as they passed us.

“Honestly, that 2018 Sporting KC playoff game was awesome,” I said. “That’s one of the loudest crowds I’ve ever heard.”

We laughed remembering that on the final goal, Daniel Salloi for Sporting KC had pulled a “No-look” finish as a final insult to the other team, sending the crowd into dreamland.

We came up over a hill. Across a valley, and up a plain of asphalt, we could see the stadium pressed into the midwest earth, the lights lazing into the late afternoon. And between us was a singing river of green, sky blue, and white.

We’d made it.

I felt a tiny pang in my stomach.

Food poisoning? No, I just felt like a kid in line for a roller coaster he’s finally reached the height requirements to ride.

[TO BE CONTINUED]