Steelers fan’s jersey ruled fair play

When lifelong Pittsburgh football fan Wendy Reagan was told she couldn’t wear a Steelers jersey as her colleagues at Safeway began to don Seahawks gear for the Super Bowl, she wasn’t about to take one for the team.

“I didn’t think it was fair that I couldn’t wear my Steelers,” said Reagan, who lives in Greenacres with her husband and two children – fans all.

So, she wore the jersey anyway. And when someone told her, again, earlier this week that she needed to ditch her Steelers apparel, her husband, Bob, decided to fight for his team.

“You can’t have a Super Bowl with one team,” he said.

Bob Reagan called up media outlets in Spokane, Seattle and Pittsburgh, preparing to make a stand for the organization that has been there for him since he started watching the NFL with his dad as a kid.

But before that happened, the Reagans said, a series of e-mails and calls between supervisors soon led to someone from Safeway’s head office calling Wendy personally to tell her the jersey was OK at the Sprague and Evergreen store.

A spokeswoman for Safeway in Seattle said Thursday the matter was simply a misunderstanding, and the company encourages employees from both teams to get into the Super Bowl spirit.

All the same, life can be tough these days for a family on the other end of the state’s first-ever Super Bowl experience.

“Everyone was telling me to take off my jersey,” said Wes Reagan, 13, who attends Greenacres Middle School with his sister, Amanda, 12.

“After awhile you get used to it, and you just smile and wave,” he said.

The family described their adventures in fandom over dinner at Bolo’s Bar and Grill, interrupted from time to time by the heckling of other clientele who spotted their matching Steelers gear from across the room.

Bob and Wendy Reagan actually started their relationship at Bolo’s 14 1/2 years ago. They were married in ‘71 after establishing that they were: a) both Lutherans, and b) both fans of the same football team.

The Reagans make it plain, though, that their support for the Steelers is wholly separate from their affection for Washington state. It just so happened that as a girl, when Wendy’s dad told her “pick a team, honey,” she liked the one with the diamonds.

“I would root for Seattle if the Steelers weren’t there,” she said.