I support Celtic because I didn't really have an option. My mum was a single parent and my granda was a Celtic fanatic. I went to my first game when I was 6 months old, at Pittodrie in 1972 (and no I cant remember the game). My first ever game (the one that I remember) was the 1977 Scottish Cup Final when Celtic beat the huns 1-0... The Andy Lynch penalty final, when my Granda flung his new bunnet in the air and was pissed-off because he never found it again. (My granda is one of these older guys who keeps a Bunnet for 20 years and still considers it a new one!)

The Eighties I remember with fondness; the Nineties I remember with fear but always optimism, albeit naive and misplaced. I think that the difference in a lot of the fans in recent years is their apparent lack of a sense of history. I don't believe you had to witness the Lions or have supported Celtic for 60 years to be a real Tim. I believe the measure is in what you feel for the team, the club and its history: the good and the bad. I've met guys in their 70's who boast about their Celtic support for 65 years and everything they have seen but only want to criticise and complain. I've also coached 12 year old kids who can tell me McGrory's scoring record and how they would have loved to have seen that header that was harder than a shot against Motherwell in the 1930's.

We all love Celtic for various reasons, for me its for the memories and not always the ones on the field. Its about watching Johnny Doyle getting sent off and fearing the worst only to end the night singing "Ten men won the league...tra la la la la"; or rolling in the grass on the pitch at Love Street knowing that if anyone from my bus saw me its an automatic 'sine die' for entering the field; or the many European trips when you knew that you expected a doin' but just maybe...just maybe…
Some of the funniest times I remember were on those European trips, especially in the 80s. (They have went downhill recently for me) The camaraderie and friendship amongst the 'tic fans was unbelievable. Until I went to Tampa last January I actually thought it had died. I remember Bremen in '88 as being one of the funniest trips that I ever went on. From start to finish it was one big laugh. The Celtic fans dressing up a rubber sex doll in a Celtic jersey, denims, hat and scarf was funny enough...however when the German police tried to arrest the doll for being too drunk to enter the ground I just about lost it...Apparently the doll couldn't stand for itself! What was worse was trying to explain to the German ticket collector that it didn't need a ticket. When McStay nearly scored someone threw the doll up in the air and it landed on the barbed wire at the top of the fence. The German police thought some crazy Tim was trying to invade the park by impaling himself on the barbwire! Maybe you had to be there and have been drinking "Steiner's" all day but the scene was just too weird.
Even funnier (And I witnessed this in Dortmund (twice) Bremen, and Paris is the idea that Celtic fans have that the local Policeman will let you have his machinegun so that you can get a photo taken with it. I really don't know how some people did not get arrested. The guy in Bremen who was pissed and pulling at the polis-guy's gun whilst trying to give him his scarf is probably fortunate not to be dead.
For every good story of course there is the not so good. The Mark Walters and the banana-throwing situation was one of my saddest. Sitting in the London Road social club as the delegate of my bus hearing Dempsey tell us we are £9 million in debt and an hour earlier the bank was going to foreclose - until him and Fergus put some money in. Hearing how people like Michael Kelly (Someone I had previously admired) were really more conniving and nasty rather than just naive and unable to run our club properly.
The saddest thing I remember about Celtic however was watching my Granda's best friend die of a massive heart attack at the Real Sociedad game in 1982. He just fell down at the pylon in the Celtic end and never got back up. He was my Granda's friend since they were 5 and it obviously affected him very badly. I always remember the guy though. His name was Francie Stirling. My granda often told me afterwards that Francie would have been happy that he died on the slopes of Celtic Park; if your gonna go you may as well be in Paradise when you do.
As I said at the beginning there are many reasons for supporting Celtic and - as hard as this may sound to some of our supporters - sometimes the results are irrelevant. Yes, we always want to win the league, but football is all about swings and roundabouts. People have a right to criticise whenever the team don't play well. It is the customer's prerogative, but sometimes you are not giving us new revelations, only telling us stuff we know but don't want to hear. Maybe I'm too ideological and too naïve, but I don't need a share certificate to claim Celtic as mine. When I watch us score last minute goals like Larsson's on Saturday I'm not angry that we couldn't beat St Johnstone 6-0, I'm relieved that we got the points. When I see one clown thinking he's an Airplane, I think of all the Celtic guys in the USA who fundraised to at least make a small difference. When I see some St Johnstone fans or the huns making monkey noises at black players in our team I don't get angry or upset and cast aspersions as I know we have some of the same type of numpties at Parkhead who will slag-off Tebily, Agathe and Bobo in the same way.

My greatest moment as a Tim wasn't seeing the '67 final - or even this years treble (the first in my lifetime being a not so sprightly 29 year old) but by being fortunate enough to pay for my Granda's season ticket book in 1998. After 9 years of hun dominance and his ever-dwindling pension he decided he just couldn't afford the £250 anymore. Thankfully my bus in True Tim fashion paid for it and let me make payments. I remember my Granda sitting beside me as the final whistle went that day in May and we won the league and stopped the 10-in-a-row. He told me that this was his last game and he had never felt so happy...amongst other things that they bastards hadn't achieved it and now he could die happy. This from an old Commie, ex-marine commando, from a half-Protestant family! Of course the "auld b*****d's" still here and now he says he will die happy when we win the Champions League!!!
But hey, that's life isn't it!?!
By Marc C