Chanting, trash talking, horrible do-rags, baseball hats, warm scarfs, jackets and blankets. That’s what a fan girl is made of. More especially an RSL fan girl. For those of you …cough “uneducated” folk out there, RSL is a major league soccer team located in Smog Valley Salt Lake. That’s right friends, while your soccer teams are pounding their cleats in the “fresh” air of New York or Kansas City, RSL has toughed it out in Smog City, USA.
Sometimes I think just sitting in the stands, we’ve beaten lung cancer, all 7 (I made this up) types of asthma, and have found our refuge as the steady pounding of the drums gets us revved up for games like nothing else. I lose my voice every time Grabavoy or Beckerman have the ball. My heart nearly jumps out of my chest as the ball speeds towards Rimando’s gloves and then whether we win or lose I walk out of the stadium with the RSL red on my chest and the fan girls in me listening intently to the sounds of strangers reminiscing plays around me.
Better than all of this though is the anthem being sung, and dare I say shouted throughout the stadium with every goal. Or the never-ending “Havi, Havi, Havi” every time he finds himself at the corner of success.
Some may call me a fanatic, some may call me just plain crazy, but something comes alive in me when I watch this team take the field and create the drama in the stands that only soccer can invoke. This, is why I’m a fan girl.
Wander Girl 
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