Friday Night Lights

All my life I have wished that I could live my life as if I were the character of a fabulous t.v. show.  As a child, it started off in the kitchen where I would host "Cooking with Erica".  I think that this behaviour was more acceptable to my mother than me having an imaginary friend because I was, in her mind, demonstrating my need for a connection to the greater audience of the world.  Little did she know it was really just because I had unrealistic dreams of grandeur.  As I grew, I took to breaking out of conversations only to address the imaginary audience that followed me with the occasional "aside".  Eventually this action proved a useful meter to gauge how patient my friends had become over the years with my t.v. dream.

Then it happened. Yes, finally I was going to have the opportunity to have my moment in the limelight. After years of waiting, my life would indeed include a prime-time moment, and that moment would come to me in the form a football game.

Though I no longer teach at my former school, I am still a bit of a diehard when it comes to school spirit.  My niece goes to the school, many of my friends still teach there, and to be honest, though I have mixed emotions about leaving, I still have a kinship to the place that will never die.  When I was a student, we did not have a football team; at least I don't think we did. So I did not have a chance to live out teenage moments at the football field.  Truth be told, even if I had had the chance, there's little chance that's where my friends and I would have been found!! Unless, of course it was under the bleachers or re-mounting a scene from Dazed & Confused.  However, for the last few years the school has been participating against its enemies on the field at a huge evening game at a "real" stadium.

The event is really something... very "U.S. high school football cliche". And who am I to avoid a good cliche?

So, this past Friday I made plans to go with my friend Leanna to Friday Night Lights.  God bless her heart, she is my side-kick on all my little romps.  We planned to meet my niece and friends at the game.  We packed our supplies: blankets, umbrellas, hot chocolate spiked with Bailey's (yes, we are the "bad" kids in the episode) and headed to Brampton toward the park with the bright lights.  To say I was excited is a gross understatement.

Once we arrived, I could not contain myself. Then, just as I exclaimed, "I finally get my cliche night", a woman stopped us in our tracks. "The game is cancelled; the Refs didn't show".  My mouth dropped open and my heart fell into the blankets I held to my chest. Leanna looked at me and let out an awkward laugh.  Then she saw my devastation.

Like a funeral march we made our way to the stands anyway.  I dropped off our stuff and went to see all the people we had planned to meet. The boys on the team were distraught when I went to greet them; I understood their pain. We mingled a bit amongst the hoards of disappointed. Then I made the choice to make the best of the situation. Damn it, I looked cute and I was not about to let the great stadium lighting go to waste.

Sooooo.........PHOTO OP!!!!!!

Obviously the best place to take a photo is on the field..... let's say right in the centre, shall we?

Oooohhhh...... Don't Debbie and Erica look great!

Yes Leanna, you are right.... we do look better and better in every photo tonight.

It doesn't look like there will be re-mount of the "big game" anytime soon.  So I suppose my dream will have to go on hold again. At least we tried to make the best of the situation... and really, isn't that all the character's in these shows do anyway?