One hundred and twenty five years is a long time. It’s almost as long as the last five minutes of a match when Barça is clinging to a one-goal lead. Galapagos tortoises and sea urchins are like, “Pffft … call me when you’re really old,” but 125 years for a football club is quite an accomplishment, particularly in a contemporary world that argues against permanence.
It’s weird to have been around for 25 of those years, a journey that began with the legendary Rivaldo chilena, an intrigued football neophyte who wanted to know more, to have some sort of a piece of something that could cause such bedlam. “It wasn’t a championship, what was it?”
Things led to things, and a journey began.
FC Barcelona, for all of its complexities, is a pretty incredible institution, one that has survived all sorts of wackiness, survived an assassination of a key figure, bad presidents, financial crises, more bad presidents. And for 125 years, the supporters who came to be known as culers have loved their club.
It’s difficult to explain why football supporters mate for life, what makes people from all over the world gravitate toward a sporting entity. For some it is success, Guardiola and trebles. For others it is magic, Ronaldinho and Messi. For still others, it is family tradition, a Catalan birthright. You support FC Barcelona, you become a soci, you go to matches.
And the larger question is, of course, what do we get out of it? We anguish, weep, scream, throw things. Joylessness is much more a companion than the indescribable joy of ultimate success. The club had a football team that won everything. Six trophies. What a time, we muse wistfully about those days never to be repeated.
What’s the payoff? Maybe, just maybe, it’s the beauty of a shared experience. Fanatic, after all, has fan as a root. We can go anywhere in the world, see someone wearing the iconic colors, smile and exchange nods, maybe stop and talk about matches, players, maybe even (shudder) real life as we get to know someone, our common bond being nothing more than our mutual suffering, week after week, as we watch and hope.
For 125 years, supporters of the club have done that. Through good times and bad, Fascism and murder, years so lean that just making European competition set off wild celebrations, like those smaller clubs that culers now look down their noses at as they celebrate making European competition.
Social media has expanded the reach of FC Barcelona to levels that are, frankly, ridiculous. Someone in Botswana can call someone in Michigan a butthead because he thinks a player should be sold. There are devoted, lifelong culers who have never been to a match. How to explain that to someone who doesn’t understand? How to explain the first time you see a match in the Camp Nou, and hear the anthem.
Tot el camp / Es um clam
None of us presumes to know anything about anything much less magic, about how a club gets attention, then under the skin, then into the blood. It is illogical. And Barça supporters disagree on so much. If you got a room full of them together they couldn’t even agree on where to go for lunch.
And yet, there is that bond. The club binds us together in a way that none of us can explain. It just is. And has been. And most importantly of all, will be. To 125 more, FC Barcelona.