...As I'm sure I've told y'all in the past, my Dad started taking me to Ole Miss football games in 1976 -- . Back then, Ole Miss played two games in Oxford and its other home games at Mississippi Veterans Memorial Stadium in Jackson. So, growing up in Memphis, Dad and I got to spend a lot of time together on fall Saturdays driving to and from the Ole Miss games.

Nine years we made those treks before I finally got to go to a bowl game -- the 1983 Independence Bowl loss to Air Force. I got to see some pretty bad football, but I also got to see wins over Alabama and Notre Dame, and a tie with LSU. Numerous times we'd get in the car to head home and Dad would say, "I'm sorry. I promise we used to be good."

When it came time to choose a college, there was never a doubt I was going to Ole Miss. I was a decent basketball player, and had offers to play hoops at places like UT-Martin, Union University and Christian Brothers University. But I had fallen in love with Ole Miss thanks to my Dad and, despite my Mom's chagrin, headed off to Oxford in 1985. On football Saturdays, I would get to see my Dad at the games. I moved to Memphis after graduation in 1990, and Dad and I again started attending games together. When Lynn and I moved to Jackson in 1992, my sister, my Mom or my uncle took my spot of going to the games with Dad, and I would just meet them at the games.

After nearly 30 years of being a season ticket holder, Dad stopped going to Ole Miss football games in 2003. He didn't like the way Ole Miss was letting go of all her traditions and how college football was becoming more of a business than a game. Mason and I at least had gotten some opportunities to watch the Rebels play with Dad -- three generations of us sitting there in the stands cheering on the Rebels. Dad wrote a letter to the Ole Miss administration explaining his decision not to renew his season tickets -- and NEVER got any kind of response after ALL those years of sitting through, looking back, some really bad football teams. But we were always there. There might have only been 20,000 people at the games, but we were two of them.

Anyway, I've always asked Dad to join us at a game. We even sometimes stay at my parents house in Olive Branch when we go to Ole Miss games. I can't repeat some of the things he's said over the years when I've called or asked him while we staying with them if he wanted to go with us...

I asked him again before my parents went home after Mason's funeral if he wanted to go to the Ole Miss game this weekend. It's Homecoming. I didn't get his usual sometimes profanity-laced response. Instead, it was, "You get me a ticket and I'll be there." Dad is meeting me in Oxford and going with me to the game this weekend!