This sunny, gorgeous weekend was a high school ritual completely unfamiliar to me — the fall rites of Homecoming. The girls’ varsity soccer team played first, followed by the boys. One boy — young man, really, on the cusp of adulthood — arrived with a couch in the back of his pickup. His teammates promptly carried it out and set up living room cheering quarters at the far end of the field.
Unlike the high school I attended (way back sometime in the 20th century), there’s no cheerleaders. The boys pull their weight in playing and cheering — and the girls do, too.
Near the end of this long afternoon of playing, a tiny girl in a polka-dot coat wandered over to keep my older daughter and I company. She picked up a crumpled leaf from the grass and handed it to me, full of wonder.
Happiness… even comes to the boulder
in the perpetual shade of pine barrens,
to rain falling on the open sea,
to the wineglass, weary of holding wine.
Pregame visit with cat.
Stony Soil Vermont 
Great post 😁
Thank you!
oh it makes me so happy to hear this – truly an instance of the kids having better than what their parents did. My daughter is at a college in which the Homecoming happens in February and it is an all-out competition for each side to write a play, complete with musical score, costumes – the works and perform with judges choosing the winner. There are also several intra-mural sport activities that contribute points and then a myriad of positions for the programs and the money management, etc – every aspect of college majors able to find a spot and participate. It is a very old tradition – born out of a women’s only college – but it is so fantastic.
Fascinating! I’d never heard of that. That sounds like so much fun, too!
After living 23 years in the USA, I still have no clue what Homecoming is. (My kids are homeschooled and too small, I suppose I could Google it 🙂 )
In the old country, when I was in school, ions ago, we had an event called 100 Days. It happened when 100 days were left until graduating from 12th grade. During this event, all 12th graders would direct and put on a creative, funny, original show for the rest of the school (first through 12th grade all in one school). That was one of my best memories from that last year. We worked so hard and had a blast as a team of young peeps just about to scatter through the world.
I’ve never heard of 100 days — of course, I’d never heard of Homecoming until my daughters attended high school, either. Really, the kids’ pleasure was in that kind of camaraderie more than anything else. Your story sounds like that same kind of fun!