In the heart of West Texas, football is what people look forward to.  "Friday nights under a full moon that filled the black satin sky with a light as soft and delicate as the flickering of a candle (Bissinger 319).  High School football is the glue that holds small towns together, and gives them a sense of pride.  In the story Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger, the small town of Odessa is described as they prepare for The Watermelon Feed, honoring their last season and the start of their upcoming season.  In this text you can feel the passion that this town has.  It focuses on how the community got involved in the game, and what traditions they had.  It examines how football is the number one priority, and how differences are pushed aside.  And through this text you can see how other spinoff stories of Texas football came to be.  Bissinger takes the reader into a boondocks town and an exciting event to see how football brings about pride and happiness to all of those who occupy it.

Permian high school for the past 40 years has revolved around this game.  They made history like having an undefeated season in 1970, and having the Football Coach of the year in 1972 (Gil Bartosh).  The high schools chant word "MOJO" was tacked across the school in the late 70's bringing pride to anyone who walked by.  A lot of people in this town went to Permian, and then went on to raise their families there, so there are generations of pride, leading to the involvement in the football community.  "When somebody talks about West Texas, they talk about football.  There is nothing to replace it.  It's an integral part of what made the community strong.  You take it away and it's almost like you strip the identity of the people" (Bissinger 320).  By the time it was 1988, rounding into a new season, the stands were full of fans young and old, who had this team and its traditions in their hearts.  One tradition the text addressed, was the schools "spirit squad", which are now the cheerleaders.  "As part of tradition, each Pepette brought one type of sweet for her player every week before the game" (Bissinger 322).  This is now something a lot of high school football teams do today (pair each cheerleader up with a player), and you wonder if it stemmed from Odessa.  Every boy wanted to be a Permian football player, and every parent wanted to raise a Permian football player, it was the way the community worked, and the generations of tradition won't change.

Football has seniority over pretty much every other issue in the town.  Academics were less important than football, "the one on top read YOU MUST HAVE A STUDENT I.D. TO BE ADMITTED TO FOOTBALL GAMES WITH STUDENT TICKETS.  The one underneath it read YOU MUST HAVE A STUDENT I.D. CARD TO CHECK OUT A LIBRARY BOOK (Bissinger 318).  It's not coincidence that football comes as a priority to academics, it came as a priority to everything.  This quote shows just how important even attending a game was, and it is one of the elements in the text that gets across how much football can run a high school.  Politics is another thing that didn't stand in the way of football.  You can bet that a town in Texas around 1990 definitely supports the republican president, George H. W. Bush who is from Texas!  This is also a southern town, and racism in the 90's is still prevalent.  As much as players like Bobbie Miles, were judged by the color of their skin, they were judged more by their talent on the field.  It really started to break a mold for American racism, and the text wanted to advertise that.  

The most important thing about this text is how it continued to effect society after being written, and how it still does today.  The impact of the book Friday Night Lights (known as the best football book ever), has stretched way past literature.  In 2004, Friday Night Lights became a tear-jerker movie about racism, and community, and how sport can bring everyone together.  To this day it is known as hands down one of the best sports films, if not one of the best films in general.  The story was then made into a TV show, which teenagers are obsessed with, appreciating the relationships, the excitement, and the family.  In a blog by Hannah Gerson, she explains how she "began to look back on my childhood in a different way, to think less about how I lived and more about how other people lived."  The story of Friday Night Lights continues to effect people of all ages, just like the way Bissinger explains how football effects people of all ages in Odessa.

Overall, this text has made a huge impact on society.  Everyone knew that football was a big deal in Texas, but no one knew exactly how much.  No one knew that Friday nights gave a dad a couple stress free hours after a long day of work, or that every kid strived to be a football player, not for the fame, but because it was their dream.  "Mojo football, it helps you survive all this sand, the wind, the heat.  I wouldn't live any other place" (Bissinger 319).  The text explained that football can unite a community, and it inspired communities all over America to continue traditions.  Friday Night Lights showed America that if football brings people joy, maybe its more important than that one bad grade.  It advertised that no matter what color someone's skin is, they are just as talented and capable as the next person.  And the impact of Friday Night Lights is still seen today in movies and Tv shows that effect everyone who watch them.  This book left made people think about the bigger picture of community and team, and how sport brings people together almost more than anything else.  

