Some people feel the rain, others just get wet....

Some people feel the rain, others just get wet

By Becca Hayne

It's 5 minutes before the start of the GWS Giants AFLW debut game of Season 4, and somewhere in New Orleans, the new season anxiety is about to begin.

Time to turn down Ryan Cabrera on the Sparklelist, fire up the HIGHLY LEGAL stream, and begin the process all over again.....

I've done a lot of time reflecting on the GWS Giants and the random nature of my support for them (which I outlined one of the early Fantales).

When the GWS Giants AFLM team made the Grand Final in 2019, it was on the back of the Giants turning their club song into a commodified meme, complete with it's own PR hashtag.

I thought about how the same piece of music means completely different things to me.

When the AFLM team plays it, it's a shrug of the shoulder, or maybe some deep seething if they beat my mighty Sainters.

But when it's sung live on the ground by my women, my inspiring women, my inspiring Giants women....

When Delma Gisu is dancing on the ground...

When Courtney Gum is celebrating the Golden Balloon of retirement....

When it's sung after games like this when a win is so utterly earned.....

If I can association the Giants song with anything, it's inspiration, passion, the joy that our misfit army has earned a win......

I love my Giants in a very different way to St Kilda for now - with St Kilda, I'm an obsessive on the details, one game in, I want to lap up the new information, find new players, new heroes, and cry endlessly at the emotion of at all.

The Giants?

I want to win......

The song wasn't sung much last year, just twice, and a lot of time was spent yelling at the laptop as Christina Bernardi milled around aimlessly around 50 from goal.

As Cora Staunton tried to win games on her own.

As Alan "The Mechanic" McConnell wouldn't pick Tait Mackrill nearly enough.....

3 minutes to go

Snacks are poured into a bowl, the laptop is loading up

Courtney Gum is gone to the Adelaide Crows, like an ex shacking up with a hot new partner, leaving you questioning if your relationship meant anything?

Christina Bernardi is gone, to mill around aimlessly at Richmond

Phoebe Monahan is gone - the night before she is amazing for Richmond, but I dismiss it, because if I'm scorned, I get very salty

Ask my ex favorite Giant who went to Geelong and who's name I've never mentioned...

Amanda Farrugia is gone...

In a few moments, she'll appear on TV in a gloriously unbiased orange top, to provide some of the most insightful commentary we can imagine....

In the last quarter, she'll even refer to GWS as "us"

Cora is back, somehow, her superhuman iron will to recover from a smashed leg beyond inspiring

1 minute to go

Jonathan Brown is on the screen, pondering "footy is almost back".......

IT ALREADY IS BACK YOU FUCKING CLOWN I scream, launching the first Malteser barrage of the season.....

I dip my hand into the remaining Maltesers

My laptop flickers in silence

30 seconds to go

In time, Gold Coast will run out, and I'll have a moment of reflecting on what it means to Suns fans and players families, snidey jokes be damned.

In time, it will rain and rain and rain

It rains a lot during Giants games

One of our traditions?

The huddled Giants fans together on the grass getting soaked, trying not to get blown away

In time, Gold Coast will kick their first ever goal, against the run of play, as we struggle to kick a goal, just like last season

In time, Bec Privitelli will raise me to my feet with some special marking

In time, Kelli Underwood will make a snide joke about tall people (#stopheighthate)

In time, Aimee Schmidt will mark, kick our only goal, and somewhere in New Orleans, illuminated in a laptop glow, a woman will scream, hoot and holler

In time, an entire quarter will pass with tackling, and collisions, but no score...

In time, an entire quarter will be delayed seemingly because the man on the PA system is too into playing Dance Monkey...

In time, the siren will go, the GWS Giants will win, and Alicia Eva will think we lost.....

And a song that sounds so, so beautiful will resonate, as my rain sodden girls dance, celebrate and sing.....

Winning matters

9

vs

8

The most beautiful set of numbers, haters be damned.....

It's all before me though at this point

5....4....3....2....1

Fox Footy theme starts

A new season is about to begin.....

The possibilities are endless......