The Nude Bills Game

    The nude beach makes me think about other nude stories - like the memorable incident of a Buffalo Bills game one December. This was probably December of 1976 – the Bills were playing at the fairly new Rich Stadium in Orchard Park – not too far from home, and in fact, it is on the same street and within walking distance of the building where I went to kindergarten. I was at the game with some of my college friends, and it was snowing. There was snow on the ground before the game that day. It was cold. Very cold.

     The Bills weren't doing well, and the fans, those bestest, most loyal fans in all the world – got disgruntled. Yelling was not enough. Not when there are snowballs within reach! Players, referees, cheerleaders were getting pelted. It was dangerous! The snowballs were keeping Security busy down on the field and in the lower levels of the stands.

      Security did not notice the man who stood up in the level of the stands where we were sitting. He was not near us; he was to our left – if we were at the 50 yard line, he was more like at the 80.

       It was about the second quarter when we saw him. We noticed because this fan was not only standing up, he was totally naked! He stood there like a statue – no movements or noises, but he was getting whiter by the minute - more from lack of blood near the surface of his skin than from the falling snow! 

       We did not gawk at him because it made us shiver just to even know he was there – standing in the nude. No one seemed to be making a fuss about the nude man in the crowd – the snowballs and the Bills were getting all the attention.

       Was he just really drunk? Perhaps insane? 

       We decided that he had probably lost a bet of some kind. At the end of the quarter, he was no longer standing there – maybe the bet was for him to stand nude for an entire quarter of the game – or maybe Security finally got to him, or perhaps he froze to death and fell over. Who knows?

       Cold is of course, relative. And we can each define it by our own experiences. My definition of cold is a naked man stoically standing whiter and whiter amongst the snowy seats of a populated football stadium with more snow falling and bitter winds blowing and a mind going numb waiting for the quarter to be over!

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