Warriors 110 – 76ers 95
Andy is my brother-in-law.
He joined the family almost 7 years ago, and 5 years ago he and my sister then also introduced my niece to us.
My family is small so every bit counts and Andy is making it count in several ways.
He’s the father of my niece, the husband of my sister and I really do consider him my brother.
I didn’t always of course.
Because my family is so small and I grew up so closely with my sister, even though we’re eight years apart, I’ve always been very protective of her and hyper critical of her boyfriends.
Andy and I didn’t start out as the friends that we are now.
We clashed, naturally.
It took us years to develop our rapport, and as we slowly grew closer, the friendship spawned from that. And it was really when my niece was born when we became brothers.
I’ve seen changes in Andy over the years. Changes that he admits really came with having a daughter, a wife and a family of his own.
Changes driven from life that demanded him to be a better man. A man that I’ll and most guys will never realize we’ll want to become until I also have a family of my own.
It’s the same changes and commitment from him to my bloodlines of my siter, my niece and my parents that made had me drop the ‘in-law’ part out of my vocabulary.
Whenever we hang out these days its always with the family, so I was really looking forward to this opportunity to get to hang out with him one on one.
The Commute
Katherine M is becoming a really great friend thanks to twitter, the Warriors and Golden Season.
She knew I was in San Jose and shot me a text asking if Andy and I would want to carpool to the game with her and her two little boys tonight.
I warned her I was sick, but she insisted.
Yup, she’s that nice.
Katherine came by to pick us up in her swagger wagon (Toyota Sienna). I rode shotgun and Andy was in the back with Joey and Jonathan.
The rain was easing up and it was only a couple days after Christmas so the roads were still pretty light.
The trip up was really quick as we passed time really getting to know one another.
Katherine and I are fans that met on twitter after she started following the blog. This was really the first time we truly were hanging out and finding out about what we’re really about. Where we’re from, what we do for a living and the history of our relationships with the Warriors.
Katherine’s love for the Warriors really begins with her kids.They really got into it and the entire family are now fans. She’s an amazing mom who finds the time and energy to bring them out to the games. And when they’re not watching the game live, they’re at home screaming at the television. It be amazing to have gotten to know her and she gets me inspired and excited about the day when I can do the same with my kids.
As we reached Oracle, Katherine said she had some good parking lot strategies which after the game proved to be pure genius. She made the worst part about the game, leaving the parking lot, easy and kind of fun.
The Game
As we filed out of the swagger wagon, Jonathan was sound asleep. In a graceful motherly fashion, Katherine picked him up and we all made our way to the Plaza.
Once we got to the entrance, we set a plan to meet up in the plaza afterward. Katherine and the boys went in and Andy and I headed into the Team Store.
It was pretty busy tonight and we had to wait in line for a few minutes before crowd control let us in.
Andy had actually bought a jersey for tonights game, but once he put it on it looked like a dress because they’re so long, so he left it behind and was looking to get some gear tonight.
We cruised the shop and he finally locked eyes on the Adidas track jacket. We scoured the racks at the team store then moved up to the adidas store but they didn’t have his size.
Out of luck, Andy wouldn’t be rocking Warriors gear as planned. He considered the warm up jackets for a hot second but the price tag was a little too high.
So after a failed attempt of scoring him a jacket we decided to grab pizzas behind my section at Pizza Universe.
As we were standing in line we ran into Monika, her brother and dad.
She was already ready to go with beer in hand and wearing that fresh Warriors hat she picked up during our Phoenix game.
We caught up real quickly and found out that we’re in the same section. They were about 8 rows back but she said she’d come by and say what’s up later on during the game.
With a couple minutes left before the half Monika came by my seats with Nik and we all hopped outside to the concourse to hang out during the break.
Andy spotted some guys eating ribs and things during the second quarter and vowed to get some at the half. So after hanging out with Monika and Nik for a few we headed up the escalator so I could introduce Andy to some amazing arena BBQ.
After Andy grabbed some honey BBQ slices of heaven we made our way to the Club 200 Lounge.
On our way we ran into my great friends Jewel, Alan and their daughter Kylie.
I haven’t seen them in a while so it was a really great surprise to see them. Jewel had the giant logo ‘City’ tee on (I wish I would have got one when it was the item of the game) and Alan had a Champs exclusive black Steph Curry jersey on. It was pretty sick.
Tonight’s game was pretty amazing because we just kept running into people.
While Andy and I were posted up I got a text from my homie JT saying he was in the house with his old UCSB track team.
He popped out to the sports bar really quick to hag with Andy and I.
JT’s and I have always been one of each others biggest supporters. We’ve done quite a bit of work together over past couple years and although I was slow on a couple things for him this past year,the dude somehow still has faith in me understanding how crazy things can get for me.
After saying goodbye and happy holidays to JT, Andy and I went back downstairs to my seats.
We made it back to my seats and the Warriors were pretty much in control the rest of the way.
Andy and I caught up on lots of things tonight. We talked about his company’s recent launch of their OnLive gaming device and also talked about how Mia was holding up with growing into being a beautiful young girl.
It was good to get some one on one time as we were able to talk on a level that we’ve hadn’t in quite some time. And being there with Andy and running into some great old friends throughout the night just reminded me that all relationships need to start somewhere and they don’t get to a really great place overnight.
With each person we ran into today, including Katherine and Andy, I began to realize that there was a lot of time, energy and patience put into each of those relationships. I always wish I could do better with staying in touch but in the end, whether it’s seven weeks or seven years, the payoff of of being patient and loyal in a friendship can bring some incredible people into your life.
I have a great new friend in Katherine and her family, Monika and I are probably closer than we’ve ever been, Jewel and Alan and I have shared some pretty great memories together, JT and I will be solid no mater how often or little we see each other, and Andy, he’s the father of my niece and has proven that he’s a vital part of my small family that cannot be replaced.
And just like the accumulation of all these relationships of people I’ve got to spend some time with tonight, it’s the same type of patience and loyalty that me and so many fans have with the Warriors.
We’ve put lots of energy into them, and no matter how far we move away and irregardless of how long of a break we take from them, they’ll always welcome us and remind and prove to us why we started down this path with them in the first place. We invest in our time with them and in turn they let us into that brotherhood that they share on the court.
Because no matter how you get introduced to the Warriors and how you develop your relationship, if you keep trying and be patient, you’ll soon recognize that you’re now family and bonded beyond blood… it’s as simple as that.
Come to a game and you’ll see what I mean.
Go Warriors,
Nam
More photos from tonight’s game:
