wrote:
Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed
Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu;
And, happy melodist, unweari-ed,
Forever piping songs forever new;
More happy love! more happy, happy love!
Forever warm and still to be enjoyed,
Forever panting, and forever young;
All breathing human passion far above,
That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed,
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.
(John Keats, "Ode On A Grecian Urn")

I love the week before. I know people, fans say they want the week to be over. They can't wait for the game to have been played, so they can watch or burn the tape, and talk about the glorious victory, or how their team got jobbed.

And I get it.

But I think back to all those old Superbowls... and aside from the games themselves, the best part, for me, was always the anticipation. Wondering what new bit of magic the team would roll out. Wondering which of the players would have the game of his life. Seeing the build up.

Once it's over... it's over. The emotion, the thrill, comes to such an abrupt end that it leaves me spinning in the middle of the field, rather like Clay Mathews, wondering what to do with myself.

I think of the week before the Superbowl, one of our Superbowls, as the afternoon before your first date with that girl you never in a thousand years would have thought would go out with you if you asked.

The date might go well, or it might be a disaster... but boy do you always feel alive during that afternoon of self doubt, self torture, elation, joy, terror and general goofiness.

I think the people who walk around saying they just want it over with are cheating themselves.