I have been an Atlanta Falcons fan since their beginning. In fact, I moved to Atlanta shortly after the team was formed in 1966. Right now I’m a happy camper.

I’ve only missed watching just a few of their games over the years. I once pulled up a paint bucket in a mall store in Atlanta and watched their game on one of the store’s television sets. And the store didn’t charge me for the time and space.

I have agonized with my beloved Falcons more than I’ve celebrated. But there were those moments — a few playoff trips and one other Super Bowl event — that always gave me hope they truly would “Rise Up.”

I go back so far with this team I can remember players like Cannon Ball Butler, Jeff Van Note, Fulton Kuykendall, Jeff Merrow, Tommy Nobis, Harmon Wages, Haskel Stanback, Claude Humphrey and Bob Lee.

I was watching the game on the night that Bob Lee at quarterback led the Falcons to their first playoff game by beating the Minnesota Vikings on Monday Night Football.

I’ve seen them look so incredibly good at moments, and then they would have a game where it seemed the team members hadn’t even been introduced to each other.  I think there was one game where a fight broke out in their own huddle.

There were those Sundays when quarterback Steve Bartkowski spent most of his day looking up at the clouds in the old Fulton County Stadium. Because of a poor offensive line, Bartkowski, who had one of the strongest arms in pro football, stayed broken up. His counterpart down in New Orleans, Archie Manning, suffered similarly.

And now we’re bound for the Falcons’ second Super Bowl.  As they quietly went to their office each Sunday and did their jobs, it seemed few commentators were giving them much credit. Finally toward the end of this season, the talking heads could not help but acknowledge a powerful team and a quarterback with “Most Valuable Player” credentials.

Early in the 2016 season, I watched my Falcons from a hospital bed. To keep my spirits up in-between bouts of extreme nausea and visions of the apocalypse, my wife would tell me the Falcons were going all the way this season “just for you.” But long ago, I embraced the reality that I could be happy with just a winning season. Getting to the playoffs was like onions and gravy on my  hamburger steak. Winning the NFC championship was two servings of the same, and should they win the Super Bowl … well that would be eating a juicy sweet watermelon on the tailgate of my dad’s old pickup after seining Wolf Creek.

So came Sunday and the long-awaited event. Early in the game, the power went off. I did not get to see Matt Ryan carve up the Green Bay defense.  But  I reminded myself that the power being off and not being able to see the Falcons in one of their proudest moments did not compare in severity as the tragedy of people whose homes were destroyed in that day’s storm and many lives being lost.

As well, through the years I had conditioned myself to such disappointment relative to the Falcons games.

I had picked the Falcons by nine points. They did better.

I know my wife was just trying to cheer me up on the bleak days in the hospital, but maybe in some strange way there is some clairvoyance going on there.

 Right now I’m just happy that the Falcons are going to the dance. I just hope they don’t have to dance with their sisters.

(Email: dwain.walden@gaflnews.com)