Game Day

Last night was the High School Homecoming game and being the glutton for punishment that I am, I worked at the concession stand. Because Homecoming is such a huge game with a large crowd, we set up a small satellite stand outside of the main one where people could buy water or soda and that's where I stood from 6 to 9. The concessions are behind the bleachers so when you're back there, you cannot see the action on the football field.

At least 75% of the kids at the game hung out near the concession stand and, by the looks of it, had NO IDEA that there was a football game happening anywhere in the vicinity.

Occasionally I would ask one of the gazillion hormonal adolescents buying Mountain Dew (why the hell anyone would drink something that looks exactly like pee is beyond me but whatever...) what the score of the game was and they would look at me blankly before answering "Ummm, I dunno. Sorry."

After getting a few blank stares - I mean, why would I be asking about football scores at a football game - I got smart and started asking Dads and Grandpas as they passed my stand on the way to the loo.

I shouldn't have asked, we lost 50-9. Ugh.

Any anthropologist would have been in seventh heaven standing where I was watching the clueless kids that were engaged in the complicated and dramatic social ritual that is attending the high school homecoming game. I saw fights and horsing around, dramatic reunions and flouncing away in a huff, younger siblings get rebuffed and others get included in the older kids play with looks on their faces that resembled veneration usually reserved for the Pope. Parents gossiped and girls discussed their dresses for the dance that is being held tonight, couples made up and broke up and staff members reminded boys that the fence was not to be climbed on.

It was ten thousand times better than any soap opera could ever hope to be and I had a really good time. There is something warm and fuzzy about being in a place where you know so many of the people walking by, get to chat with friends you don't see very often and watch kids you've known since they were in kindergarten pretend that they are adults while realizing that they really are close to grownup. Lots of the kids friends ran up and gave me big bear hugs and I was more than a little shocked to find myself looking up at most of them now.

My feet hurt and I'm exhausted but last night was fun and is the reason I volunteer at the kids school events. I'm part of a wonderful community and so incredibly lucky for it.