....the lesson all true fans painfully learn, that the essence of sport is disappointment masked by periodic bursts of joy and nurtured by denial."

I didn't write this; it's from a very good book I just finished: "The Last Season" by Stuart Stevens, an account of an Ole Miss fan who, turning 60, goes to a season of games with his 95-year-old dad and, in the process, revisits memories of his childhood growing up in the deep South.  

I think many of you could relate to various aspects of this story.

In any event, the sentence above is a fascinating description of one person's perspective on being a fan.  Would you say this describes your experience as an Ohio State fan?  As a fan of some other team?