Cowboys loyalty part of childhood

Since I grew up in legendary Cowboys quarterback "Dandy" Don Meredith's hometown of Mt. Vernon, Texas, and hauled hay for his parents, it is illegal for me not to be a Cowboys fan.

As a youngster, I rode 100 miles to a Dallas-Green Bay pre-season game at the Cotton Bowl with my father and his steel-mill buddies to watch Meredith play.

To teach me an undesired value-of-a-buck lesson, my dad made me pay for my own ticket.

From mowing yards, I had saved $6. I figured that would also cover hotdogs and a #17 jersey.

When the ticket cost a heart-thudding $6, my hatred for trickle-down economics began.

Although my twin sister outweighed me, I played football as a 105-pound junior and 123-pound senior for the district-champion Tigers.

The band and FFA were acceptable alternatives -- but I was unfamiliar with treble clefs, and thought that alfalfa was a Little Rascals character.

So, it was football or be an east-Texas outcast.

This rambling preamble explains why I'm not a fan of the Yankee-land Giants or Patriots in today's Super Bowl.

Out of blue-star loyalty, I do root for the NFC (excepting Houston and Denver).

But Tom Brady's looks, wealth and talent are the real reasons that I am rooting against the Patriots.

Because my heroes have always been Cowboys, I'm betting $6 that the trickle-down economics of envy will finally heal my childhood scar over my heroes bankrupting me.