Every Sunday, the neighbors could hear my father scream five houses away but were afraid to say anything. That was during the lean years -- the 1980s.
After dominating the 1970s with four Super Bowl victories, our beloved Pittsburgh Steelers were slipping further down the divisional food chain.
Mark Malone was our quarterback and Walter Ambercrombie our backfield (who? Exactly). Louise "Hot" Lipps was the Steelers' only decent receiver. He was an average wideout with a Hollywood name who faded from memory faster than yesterday's breakfast. But I was 11 years old and wanted a sports hero. So I flaunted his jersey, number 83, which was promply ruined by my best friend, Jason Jordan, who wore it one day without realizing he had a body odor problem.
I tried to forget the jersey and the team and hid inside my Steelers helmet with the number 32 on the back (Franco!) and wore thin an NFL highlight film about the 1978 team, who destroyed the opposition and assured their faithful that the Lombardi trophy would find its way to Pittsburgh in the end.
Bradshaw. Harris. Swann. Bleier. Lambert. Stallworth. Greene. These were the guys I adored and would trade two mint condition Jerry Rice rookie cards just to hold a bent-cornered cardboard square with their creased photo and stats on the back, darkened with bubblegum grease.
Eighteen years later, I'm not dwelling on those guys so much. I've got Roethlisberger, Bettis, Ward, Parker, Farrier, Porter and Polamalu on my mind. They give me hope that, after we lost the Super Bowl 10 years ago to the Cowboys, I may actually get to celebrate a championship (I was too young to remember the 1970s glory).
And these guys are very different from the '78 team. They are not dominant. An 11-5 record, they scared the hell out of me this year, going through three quarterbacks -- two of whom are over-the-hill and one who is a cocky 23-year-old punk from Miami, Ohio who inspired us with his ability NOT to blow the game.
Then there's the coach. Bill Cowher, God love him, is a great man who I'm sure will one day do Pennsylvania proud in the US Senate. But he is no Chuck Noll, whose father-like disapproval of a team that dismantled people like Roger Staubach, Earl Campbell and Fran Tarkenton inspired all of us who bled black and gold to know that we had a coach for whom the expectations were higher than even our's.
Of course, there are a few similarities -- from certain tested formulas you do not deviate. We have two quality running backs in Willie Parker and The Bus (I'll not count Duc, whose Sunday fashion of choice appears to be sweatpants -- what a coincidence, so is mine!) and a nasty defense with intimidating blitz packages.
More than anything, though, we have a cast of characters with a great story line. And this is where I think I can find common ground with people who would seem to have no reason to care at all about this Super Bowl.
We all (New England fans, I'm talking especially to you) want to BELIEVE in the "destiny" story. It's why I bought a Red Sox hat before the playoff series with the Yankees in 2004. It's why some of you may have ordered up your own Terrible Towell this year.
Here we have a collection of personalities -- the loudmouth (Porter), the zen warrior (Polamalu), the guy who plays for the love of the game (Ward), the brash youngster (Roethlisberger) and the aging veteran looking to go out on top (you know who) -- underdogs on the road throughout the playoffs, playing inspired football and toppling one Goliath after another for a city that desperately wants and, yes, even needs it. This is a place in which the hometown newspaper, the day after a US court took up Al Gore's appeal of the 2000 presidential election, ran a lead front-page story about hockey that screamed 'MARIO RETURNS.' Sports is more than a matter of sport in Pittsburgh.
Can Seattle say that? Or has "coffee culture" won you over?
So yes, I want this. Badly. Just ask my right thumb, which I injured while punching my ceiling during the final minutes of the Indianapolis game. But I want this not just because I'm a Steelers fan looking to win "one for the thumb." I want this because Pittsburgh -- its coach, its players and the gritty city itself -- provides the dramatic tension that makes this game seem to matter.
I want to see my team, out there in the white jerseys, having fought for every road victory so far, fighting some more for one last win.
I want to see the defense have not one, but three goal line stands and sprint off the field shouting for Big Ben to take the offense down the field and score.
I want to see Hines 'Psycho' Ward get the crap knocked out of him, and get up grinning because he caught a first down pass and got his team that much closer to kissing the Lombardi trophy.
I want to see Cowher spitting with fury because his guys are letting down the Iron City in which he grew up, and then spitting some more because they are punching out victory in the fourth quarter.
And yes, I want to see number 36, that asthmatic bespectacled fat boy, all grown up, in his hometown, run through would-be tacklers all the way to the end zone and give the ball to Mom and Dad.
I want it all. So do you.