Where I Reveal A Love For Fried Dough that JUST AIN’T RIGHT

For our local high school, it’s been homecoming week. A few weeks ago, The Princess’s school sent home a note saying that the first graders would be singing “God Bless America” before the game, so hey, on to the calendar it went: Homecoming Game.

Remember, this is a small town and people generally follow one of two paths: a) Never Leave, or b) Leave And Never Come Back. Or if you’re wild and crazy like me and Hubby, you’ll leave, swear you will never in a million years go back to that little corn-growing hick town… and then you’ll go back. Homecoming games are really no different than any other Friday night game at the high school – remember, a lot of them never left.

I try to never go to games – and not just because the football team never wins or because I get a little nostalgic for my short little polyester skirt. I avoid them because running into my past constantly gets a little bit too much. I can take it occasionally, but for every Friday home game? Um, nope.

But today we had to go. We went early for the Homecoming Parade (to which I say, WTF – we didn’t have a freakin’ parade for homecoming when I was in high school!), then ventured to the high school parking lot where they were serving free hot dogs and popcorn and food for everyone (my tax dollars hard at work, y’all. Hot dogs. We can’t get a community recycling center, but dangit, processed meat byproducts for everyone!). Standing in line for the (ugh) hot dog, I heard someone calling my name. I turned around. My old high school cheerleading coach. Heeeeeeeeeeeeeey. There’s a face I hadn’t seen in awhile.

I sat on a hill with The Princess watching her eat her hot dog and people watching (hooray for big sunglasses!), seeing face after face that I recognized. I then led The Princess to the spot where she’d be meeting her teacher and classmates to prepare to sing – then it was like bullseye – face after face of people I went to school with. Including a girl I cheered with, only recognizable because she was wearing one of our cheer sweatshirts… from SIXTEEN YEARS AGO… with her name on it. Now, I’m a packrat. I’m a pretty bad packrat. But I’m fairly sure I tossed my sweatshirt better than ten years ago. Then again, if I didn’t see her name screen printed in that megaphone on the back, there is no way in hell I’d have known who it was. NO. WAY.

While I was with the girls, Hubby was on an IMPORTANT MISSION. To fetch for me an elephant ear. I love elephant ears – they go against everything I believe in, healthwise, but there is seriously nothing better. It was amazingly greasy, sugary, and cinnamon-y. I shared (a little bit of) it with Hubby and Pumpkin, but that sucker was history within minutes, and I have to say, I’m reasonably certain I would knock small children out of the path if they interefered with my getting an elephant ear. So so so wrong. Come to find out, like the hot dogs and popcorn, my elephant ear was free. Free. (Had I known that prior to eating it, I’m sure it would have tasted that much better).

We left The Princess with her teacher and Hubby and I took Pumpkin to find a seat. I ended up two rows in front of my BFF’s ex-hubby, who either didn’t notice or acknowledge me (that’s alright, I didn’t acknowledge him either), sat through a painful marching band rendition of Joan Jett’s “I Hate Myself For Loving You” before my kid came out on the track to sing.

And there was such a huge group of first graders, I couldn’t see her. Every picture I took is just this giant mob of little kids. Fun. After her performance, I had to walk over to the end of the field to get her – and seriously had one of those weird flashback moments of walking on that track on Friday nights before football games (yes, I loved cheerleading – and that is why I was MOST SCHOOL SPIRIT 1994). I passed my senior year boyfriend as I walked down the track – walking in opposite directions, we smiled and said hi and kept walking like it was an everyday thing (Funny isn’t it, how for a time someone seems like your whole world and then life happens and they are just extras in the background?).

Now that I’m home, I am in a near vegetative state from my massive fried dinner. That’s alright though. Typically a maybe once-a-year treat, I won’t get this gorged, stuffed to my gills feeling for at least twelve more months.