Editorial
Homecoming is Life

The life of an editorial writer is not an easy one. He must search far and wide for new editorial ideas to bring to his readers each and every week.

My search for an editorial for Homecoming brought me to the top of a mountain ravaged by crisp fall snow. I stood on a precarious ledge, peering through the heavy snow-laden wind; and as the gale parted, I saw ahead of me the figure of a man dressed in heavy, flowing white robes. His long, thick beard, naturally white, was highlighted by the snowflakes that glistened as they melted under his breath. From his mouth dangled a banana peel which he was smoking.

"Oh, Great Swami," I called to him, "may I beg you to speak for an instant to me?"

His weary head, heavy with the weight of knowledge, nodded.

I sat down next to him and opened my notebook. "Swami, I search for an editorial for my readers. Tell me: what is Homecoming?"

The swami took a drag from the peel and looked up from out of baggy-lidded eyes. "My son, Homecoming is Life."

"Could you elaborate, oh elaborate one?"

"It is from Homecoming that children learn many wonderous facts that aid them in continuing their future lives. Take for instance the mystique of the human female." The guru sighed. "Boy Hush Day serves to educate people in the true nature of male-female relations. The boys are silent to the women, unyielding. Women, meanwhile, must try to please the men to get their nametags, or their praise, as the case may be."

"Somehow, I don't think that's what the Homecoming Committee had in mind," I told the swami.

"Hush, unknowledgeable one," was his reply. "Further witness the Powder-Puff Football Game in which females compete for the pleasure of the male spectators. Witness also the return to nostalgia: the willingness of the people to return to the days when women were seen and not heard. Surely not all this is accidental?"

"And of course, the Homecoming Queen Elections," I responded. "But what of, say Colour Day?"

"There is also enhancement of the psyche. Colour Day demonstrates the usefulness of complimentary colours in everyday life. Why think how terrible the world would look if everything clashed with everything else. A valuable lesson indeed. Along this same line is the Car Decorating Competition, showing functional design and the use and method of advertising; and Out-Style the Bruins Day during which the children are taught the beauty of self-adornment."

"Are the sciences included?" I questioned, hoping to find flaw in his reasoning.

"Take ye notice of Lick-Em Day: the suckers abound; kids are showing how friction can be used to wear down a surface. The Bon-Fire gives a lesson on the combustibility of substances and the laws of thermodynamics as witnessed by the heat near the fire and the cold away from it."

"What of the theme of Homecoming, 'Football Players Past, Present, and Future?'"

"It readies them for death, for the acceptance of Time, seeing that they, like the football players, will one day be thought of in the past tense; and the hope of tomorrow: there will be others to carry on in the future."

"You know, Swami, I think this is all a big put-on," I said.

"What, my answers or your Homecoming?" he replied.

[by Rick Hines]