the fact that i now have a clip with "revelry" in the title brings me great joy.

time for stories - three in today's paper (well, two combined under one headline), which is why the brain was fried yesterday.

the revelry-headed column turned out pretty well for a "hey, just go and do whatever" assignment - such a fun night to cover.

had a homecoming of sorts yesterday while covering proctor/wilmington soccer championships, as i naturally watched the games with three quarters of proctor's residents ... it was fun, though. got to catch up with some teachers and people i haven't seen in ages as well as touch base with old friends from the phs days. i ran into a guy i had a crush on in high school and we wound up talking for eons ... i think yesterday's coversation was longer than any conversation we ever had as students (hell, probably longer than all conversations combined - i was a bit shy back in the day) and it was so fun.

the father of a guy i graduated with was there, as he's the self-appointed king of school events, particularly athletic ones - i never particularly liked the man, as he had severly distorted versions of himself as being above 99.99% of the rest of the town's residents.

as i passed by, notebook in hand, to interview the victorious proctor coach, he did a doubletake. i smiled politely and said hello, and he replied with, "oh woah! vickie! i didn't even recognize you - you look so old now!"

yeah, well i'm not the only one, if you know what i'm sayin, buddy.

both the boys and girls were playing in the championships, so i was able to watch my fomer team battle it out for the title, under the coaching of my favorite coach ever. i'd only seen one other girls game since graduating (the championship they won my freshman year of college- they were playing at smc and i had to be there to have the salt rubbed in the wound personally), and it was bizarre to stand on the sidelines, watching the girls i never played with responding to the shouts coach hollered from the sidelines, calls for plays that were the same as when i'd played. i felt like i needed to get out there and do it myself ...

the moment that got me, though, was right before the game started, with the traditional proctor oobie cheer.

same deep, primal shout.

"oobie!"

same chorus of female adolescent shrieks.

"cha!"

"oobie!"
"cha!"
"oobieoobieoobie!"
"chachacha - HA!"

oobie was my favorite moment of a soccer game - besides playing, that is. the cheer makes no sense to anyone else - a bunch of gibberish, really. but it's a way of showing that all of the messed-up logic of everyday life is out of the team's mind. just focusing on the job at hand and the game to be played. and it shows that the team is in sync with the coach - all are fired up and ready to dominate.

for some reason in the back of my mind, i'd almost hoped that coach had retired oobie once i graduated.

it's the one moment during the game that i felt tears start to well up in my eyes.