Rah Rah Rah

Well, today my littlest sister had her final performance/competition as a member of her cheer squad, and she did a great job. She even received a medal.

Now, this cheer competition took place at a fairly large gathering in the basketball auditorium at Northwest Nazarene University. I'm not certain how many other squad of different sizes and ages were in attendance, but suffice it to say there were many. If I were to make a guess I would say there were roughly 200-300 perky adolescent girls from all over Idaho and Utah. I attended so as to support my sister and her squad, but prior to leaving for the competition I had no idea what I would be in for once we arrived there.

In short, it was everything I had expected (unfortunately) and much, much more (even more unfortunately). Despite my apparently bad attitude about the whole experience, I did make some interesting observations about the event.

Basically, for four straight hours the air was filled piercing shrieks and popular (though not with me) music. And when I say music, I mean...well, let me put it this way: I have one Katy Perry song ("Hot 'n Cold") on my Ipod. It has now been erased so that I will never have to listen to that song again, even by accident. Further, if Lady Gaga were, by some freak chance (and yes, I use the word freak purposely), on my Ipod, she would quickly meet the same fate. I'm pretty certain that each squad used the same mix of songs in different orders because I heard more Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Backstreet Boys, and other such (eesh!) music than I have ever cared to in my entire earthly existence. I heard about ten seconds of CCR's "Travelin' Band" and five seconds of "Pour Some Sugar on Me" by Def Leppard, but other than that, the music selection was enough to make me wish I had taken Odysseus's advice and stuffed my ears with wax (see Homer's The Odyssey).

However, it was interesting to see how many of the mothers in the audience (and there were quite a few) who happened to be dyed brunette (I was looking around a lot because the cheer performances were not exactly riveting). I'm not sure if it's a cheer-mom trend or if they merely want to be involved with cheerleading while simultaneously distancing themselves from the--how can I put this--blonde reputation carried on by the (gulp) sport called cheerleading. All I know is this: I have not seen that many brunette dye jobs in one location for a long time. Perhaps ever. But that was the least of the oddities I witnessed.

I saw one girl out in the corridor practicing a butterfly routine (she flitted over and over for about five minutes from one side of the hall to the concession stand and back again), but I think she was trying to work the hyperactivity out of her system because she never performed it in front of the audience.

Another girl could not bear to separated from her cellular device, but she needed her hands free while she carried her large bucket of popcorn, so she was walking around with her phone stuck halfway into the waistband of her cheer uniform.

A coach, of all things, borrowed a bow from one of the girls on her squad (I believe that squad was from Utah), entered the jump-off competition at the end, and, pretending to a member of her own squad, performed against all of the little girls who were actually a part of the competition. No one caught it though, and she walked away with a medal. Now that's some crazy competitive spirit.

Oh, and then there was all the wedgie-picking. Everytime I looked around the room, there was another performer adjusting her spankies. Some were red, some were black, and some were zebra-striped, but they all had one thing in common: they were riding up.

Also, some of the girls (ahem, many) were wearing so much makeup one had to think they were one of three things: child prostitutes, clowns, or cheerleaders. Since prostitution is illegal in Idaho and there weren't any sad clown faces, I could only guess that they were cheerleaders.

Finally, I noticed a woman (a spectator, not a performer) farther down the bleachers who was wearing a black hoody with a gold sequined "z" on the back, along with what I believe was her own cheer uniform: a glittering gold mini-skirt with leopard print spankies showing and matching snow boots. Even I, with my limited sense of style, know that it is taboo to go out in the world (nay, even to stay at home) wearing something like that. I guess the power of the cheer spirit must have possessed her body because I don't know what else could have possessed her to show herself in public that way.

To top it off, we had to pay to get in to this event. Ten bucks a person. The nerve some people have. Taking advantage of me and mine just because I wanted to support my sister in her recreational interests. Tsk, tsk, tsk.

I mean, um, Go, team, go?