Angels of City

See what I did there?

Look, you haven’t heard from me because to be honest, there hasn’t been a lot to report. There’ve been visits, there’ve been colds, and there’ve been (THANK GOD) some freelance copywriting projects that depleted my writing brain, already running on limited capacity. But you, my legions of adoring fans, are never far from my mind. And so I am returning triumphant with a report on the latest happenings. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

And now we return to our regularly scheduled programming…

At least for this week…

For this week’s adventure I can thank my friend Ellen (who I also have to thank for my Oklahoma adventure). Ellen and I usually hang out with our respective children, which means we rarely are able to finish a thought let alone a conversation, so the prospect of a normal adult interaction was appealing without the added bonus that Ellen offered me her extra ticket to an Angel City F.C. game.

Angel City F.C. is the Professional (Women’s) Soccer team in Los Angeles. LA F.C. is the (Professional) Men’s Soccer team in Los Angeles. To get to the stadium, we drove to downtown Los Angeles and took the metro from there, which, as previously reported, is normally extremely scary. But this station was brand spanking new. The train even arrived right as we got to the platform. Things were going our way.

Our destination was Exposition Park, which is right next to U.S.C.  I’d spent some time in the neighborhood a few years back, when I found a cobbler there to stretch out a pair of Doc Martens that were too small for me. No amount of stretching, as it turned out, could make them fit my enormous toe box. My cobbler, refusing to accept defeat, told me that sometimes the issue of the shoe not fitting was “in the mind.” You would think this was the only time I’ve been gaslit by a cobbler, but the next one I found lost a pair of shoes I had dropped off and then called me years later demanding I come pick them up immediately before he got rid of them. Where was I?

We exited the metro (a glorious street-level, outdoor station) into Exposition Park, which is a beautiful rose garden that expands in every direction to a different museum. We followed the expanding stream of fans through the park, down an alley, and across a parking lot to the stadium itself.

IMAGE DESCRIPTION: Exposition park, it’s roses and rotunda see under the dark, gathering rainclouds which are actually a beautiful sight in Los Angeles.

IMAGE DESCRIPTION: One of the science museums, seen from the back alley that led to a parking lot, where from the right (?) angle it looks like a fighter jet is flying into the building. Oops!

Everyone was wearing the team colors, pink and black. Some people were wearing Hello Kitty paraphernalia. This is because it was Hello Kitty night. If you asked me before the game how popular I thought Hello Kitty was, I would have said “not very,” but I would have been “quite very” wrong.

I’ve been to a handful of men’s (professional) sporting events in my life and they all sucked compared to this (women’s) professional sporting event (no offense). Everyone was respectful, it was easy to get in and out of your rows, the food wasn’t one billion dollars, there were lots of excited little girls, and you didn’t feel the constant threat of a fight about to break out at any moment.

I marveled at the athleticism required for soccer, a sport which seems harder than a lot of other sports and specifically a lot of men’s (professional) sports (no offense). There aren’t really “time outs” which means everyone is running and kicking and kicking and running the entire time. Everyone had the most impressive legs I have ever seen in my entire life, only rivaled by the most impressive ponytails I have ever seen in my entire life. It’s great to watch people sprint down a field, a giant ponytail swishing behind them.

IMAGE DESCRIPTION: The field, the players, the fans, the Hello Kitty headbands.

After an hour and a half of so much running even I was suffering from second-hand exhaustion, each team had scored two goals. The clock rain out and the game ended and everyone started to get up and I said, “What the hell?” Ellen had to explain that in soccer they don’t do tiebreakers in “the regular season.” It’s just a draw. That seemed insane to me, but as someone attending my first professional soccer game, I had to accept that’s how the sport worked.

As we were walking out I noticed the slide on the jumbotron that said, “1% of your ticket sales go directly to our athletes.” I scoffed, “That’s not a lot.” Then Ellen told me that it’s actually more than any other professional (even male) league so I tried to do some math in my head and on my iPhone but then gave up and had to accept that’s how the sport worked.

We took the train back to downtown LA with our fellow fans. When we took the elevator up to the street from the station, a woman wearing Angel City gear had the following exchange with a man wearing a Mets hat (I do not know if they knew each other previously and am not sure that it matters):

WOMAN: “Well, how did you like your first game?”

MAN: “I liked it.”

WOMAN: “Better than the Mets?”

MAN: “I don’t know about that.”

(Chuckles from the entire elevator.)

MAN: “The Mets wouldn’t end on a tie.”

I understood where he was coming from in some ways, but then I remembered a lot of the reason I don’t like sports is I feel bad for the people who lose, and the nice thing about a tie is everyone is a winner and everyone is a loser. Also, once the game was over, the players from both teams went over to each other and hugged each other and caught up and kicked each others ankles (I think this is how soccer players high five each other). It was very sweet and wholesome and I think the most important thing is all the children at the game saw a tiny little glimpse into how sometimes, as a society, we can get things sort of right, even for as little as 1% of ticket sales.  

IMAGE DESCRIPTION: Empty seats, empty michelada, abandoned Hello Kitty headbands (Still Life, 2024).