Sports have been such a refuge. While the world deals with financial drama and natural disasters, our family has been dealing with unemployment. And professional sports have been helping us through it.

I lost my job 8 months ago. After eight years at the same law firm my position was down-sized. When you are mistreated and discarded, you need something to hold on to. For me, and also surprisingly for my family, it has been the San Francisco Giants, the Denver Broncos and the Sacramento Kings to which we have clung.

My wife has always been a Broncos fan.  That one was easy. Plus they are winning which always helps. We usually root for the Texas Rangers in the post-season of Major League Baseball, but they got eliminated early. So by default we rooted for the nearby Giants. They didn’t let us down. And this year we discovered that we could watch all of the Sacramento Kings games on TV, and we even got to go to one as a family Christmas present. So we've been following the hometown team, even if they aren’t consistently competitive.

Maybe the real surprise has been my six year old autistic son. He has really taken to watching sports. Now when we watch football he asks us to mute the sound so he can provide the play by play. That has been fun and it has really brought us together.

In eight months I have gone from a casual professional fan to an avid watcher of whatever sport happens to be on at the time. Sure, it is escapism. But it has also been family time. And in times like these you need whatever you can get to help hold you together.