TCU Football: The Heart Of A Horned Frog

"Never underestimate the heart of a Horned Frog."

--Riff Ram (an anonymous profile on Twitter)

"Dreams come true. Without that possibility, nature would not incite us to have them."

--John Updike

What happens when our dreams come true? When the image, which we nurtured in our soul so strongly as to sap it of gravity, meets and marries its physical copy—all the more beautiful for being real, or, perhaps, marred by that very beauty, that very reality? What deeply intimate conceptual change accompanies the apple of our mental eye falling upon the soil of our material one? At what point can the observer say: “Yes, I have imagined this for years and decades--more, my mother and father all their days--and now the purple confetti, the night air asparkle with starry tinsel, a raised trophy, a gilded ball cradled upon its miniature plinth, a video board announcing we are champions heading to our National Championship that has been waiting for us as much as we it these last eighty years, and now it is happening exactly as I imagined--or perhaps differently?" What fear? What ecstasy? At every moment, the daily monotonous torment of the mundane threatening to spoil the party while the stubborn optimism of the dreamer insists upon its thrilling rights.

I cannot quite say I had that experience at the Fiesta Bowl on December 31, 2022 when TCU upset Michigan--not that I did not share in the unmitigated joy of seeing the Horned Frogs victorious. But being new to the world of sports, I cannot in sincerity claim I have been waiting long enough nor passionately enough to equate my reasonable desire for TCU's success with the long-frustrated dream of my counterparts. My joy is that of someone new to the party, a party, he finds, is the best-kept secret around. But I saw the reality of a realized dream stamp its ruddy image on the faces of many of those around me, including my parents, my friends, the fans nearby, people who have waited fifteen years, or twenty or thirty or more—some their whole lives—for a moment that materialized before their dazed senses such they dared neither to doubt nor believe its reality. I saw awe in their eyes, heard it in their febrile voices, their words. “Unbelievable . . . I can’t believe it . . . How could we have doubted . . . They proved everyone wrong . . . We proved everyone wrong . . . I’m so proud to be among . . .”

Of course, these are, to be frank, rather bland sentences. Nevertheless, when reality settles, the blood still feverish, even phrases as hackneyed and corny as these, in context, possess a dreamy quality, as though their speakers were drunk on a blended malt of poetry and prophecy.

When the intensity wears off an explanation is due. Grown men weeping openly for winning a game? People with soap tongues spouting profanity after bad calls? Our rational selves need justification. And that is where the happy moral of the story hops hare-like from its own hat and, cane in hand, dances off the stage, its moral and message clear: it's all about heart, the heart of a Horned Frog.

That this explanation is invented does not make it false. Quite the opposite. The substantive need to explain in equally substantial terms our enthusiasms calls us to see ourselves through a different lens, a creative one, that from which dreams are composed.

We find Max Duggan fighting like a warrior in the last minutes of the Big 12 Championship and recognize whether he fails could hurt nor hinder him any more than had he succeeded: it was/is always about the passion, was/is the refusal to quit, was/is, indeed, the total incompetence to quit were he to try.

Similarly, when the scoreboard enumerates our wishes and Griffin Kell kicks the field goal, Barber catches the pass, Miller dives into the endzone, these victories are epiphenomenal to the truest victory, that of the spirit, the heart.

In 1935, Delmore Schwartz wrote a short story, titled “In Dreams Begin Responsibilities.” Such a phrase would seem on its face an oxymoron. No doubt, to our common sense (itself more oxymoronic than some would suppose), dreams are the surest way of eschewing responsibility?

Until they come true and we hope to be worthy of them.

What changes when our dreams come true? Our dreams or ourselves? Is there a difference?

Want to join the discussion? Click here to become a member of the Killer Frogs message board community today!

Follow KillerFrogs on Twitter to stay up to date on all the latest TCU news! Follow KillerFrogs on Facebook and Instagram as well. Download the KillerFrogs app on Google Play or in the Apple App Store.