large_tailgating_jo1Who is Gar?  Gar is a husband, a father, a competitor, a lawyer, a tailgate neighbor, and a friend.  He is someone we have both loved and loathed.  Someone who we have gone out of our way to locate at away games, and on some occasions made no effort at all to see even though he was a mere quarter-mile away after we traveled 400 miles.  He is a chef, coming up with such creations as the Garwich and reuben casserole.  He has surrounded himself with a rag tag cast of characters that often includes JJ, whose marinated salmon comes close to turning your attention away from the inordinate amount of chest hair that is billowing out of the neck of his shirt, and Cooper, whose blind dedication is noble…if not a bit mancrush-ish.  There’s a couple of other guys, they don’t talk much, don’t contribute anything of note in a physical sense, but they do provide a quiet comfortability, like red necks on a porch drinking Miller High Life gazing at a dust jacket covered Impala on blocks in their front yard.  But none of that matters.  He would tailgate alone if the situation presented itself.  He invites you, but doesn’t need you.  He’ll cook a bushel basket full of Garwiches, and if they go uneaten, he’ll eat those things all week, and as he bites into that tenth one on Tuesday of the following week, the glint in his eye will undoubtedly say “kiss my ass.”

Gar is a man that rules a world, his world…Gar’s World.  You just live in it.

In a mere 10 days, our group will assemble in a new spot, away from Ann Arbor Golf and Outing for the first time in 15 years, before this website existed, before the web itself existed.  Gone will be the wide open spaces, the lush fairway, children playing in the sandtrap, men peeing in the trees, and our tailgate neighbor’s triple wide Michigan tent tucked into the fir trees.  That tent, in that spot, just a stone’s throw away from our group of 100+, once was Gar’s home, and often times it only Gar’s home…until much closer to kickoff.

In the end though, we will certainly miss his wit, his misdirected politics, his passion for Michigan Football, his keen ability to take a group picture, and his earring.  Gar is moving too, to a land without alcohol.  But I’m sure if you visit him, you will still be able to get your Miller High Life in a solo cup, a Garwich, and a lesson in the communistic ideals of nationalized healthcare.

Gar.  Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar.  Goodbye.

Shit.  We’ll probably see him at Iowa.