Up with the Heathens!

Homecoming: an American college tradition. 

Here are a few highlights:

• A 113-year football rivalry between Sewanee and Rhodes for the glory of the Edmund Orgill trophy came down to the last few seconds in a cold fog so thick no one on the Rhodes side could actually saw their boys win.
• My friends' son Phillip was the first sprinting across the field to grab the trophy -- joyously -- for a game in which he played twice.
• Over-zealous parents badmouthed the refs; one said, "Just let him come over here with his seeing-eye dog, and my dog'll take 'em."  Mind you, her dog, a young golden lab, was at that moment madly licking the head of a fan sitting below her master.
• Old fight songs evoked college histories: Rhodes' song still includes its original name of Southwestern; Sewanee's proclaims "Down with the heathen.  Up with the church. --  Yea, Sewanee's right!"
• The homecoming court reflects of the college, including two dozen couples: a caped fellow and preppily clad young woman huddled in conversation with an earringed young man and his date, a coed whose dark hair was shaved above the right ear and dyed bright red.
• Even the weather was memorable: 44 degrees with strong wind and spitting fog.
• Along the walk home, behind me, one student said to another, "Are you drunk?"  "No, man, not now." "Me either." " Yeah, man, I kept getting my father to bring me drinks."

I am not much of a football fan, but I am of Sewanee, and I am of my friends who came from New Orleans to see their son play in the last two weeks of his college career. 

On this day, the visiting team won, and I cheer the heathens.