A Slight Case of School Spirit Overkill

Once I started posting this blog, I realized that my immediate family probably wouldn't be too thrilled with me if I gave their real names out "on the air", as it were. My wife has decided that her online alias will be Olivia. I know this seems hokey, but this is the only untruth I intend to tell on this blog - the names are being changed to protect the innocent, or the easily embarrassed. My real name, however, is Rob Chambers. So there :)
Anyway, my wife Olivia and I went to her college Homecoming and Alumni Band (of which she's a part - she played clarinet in college). She went to Baylor University, which is a college in the same hometown as David Koresh and was recently the site of an alleged murder (gotta remember to protect myself from libel) of one of their basketball players.
Before I illustrate to you what yesterday was like, you have to know a little about me. I didn't go to a school that had oodles of school pride. California State University Northridge was (and is) a commuter school, and the most notable thing to come out of CSUN is the earthquake that hit it in 1992 or so (yes, I was in that quake). One of the things it's certainly not known for are the following:

• Marching band


• Football


• School Spirit of any measurable kind

So, it was something of a kick in the back of the head to leap into the deep end of Homecoming at Baylor. They have all these rituals that they do at the games, like waving their hands in the air and shouting out "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh Sic'em Bears!!!!" They seemed to do this everytime Baylor got a touchdown. Or a field goal. Or whenever it seemed that things were getting a bit boring, which was often - Baylor got their butts kicked like (in the words of Dennis Miller) a narc at a biker rally. Baylor played Texas Tech and it was simply sad how badly Baylor did. But the crowd kept up their spirits - this was Homecoming, after all. One lady from the class of '86 sitting next to me said "The Lord knows someone has to win and someone has to lose." This was another thing that I had to keep in mind: Baylor is a Baptist university, whereas my religious upbringing was an even mix of Roman Catholic and common sense (i.e. God has a sense of humor, something I think a lot of more fundamentalist Christians seem to forget, along with the fact that Jesus was Jewish). Anyway, it was little odd how devoted some of these people were to their school - I've seen a similar kind of pride in alumni from Texas A&M and the University of Texas,among others.
Now, this is not to say that I had a bad time. Despite the fact that it drizzled all day, I had a great time, mostly playing with the children of one of my wife's former dormmates. I even watched them while she and my wife went down on the field to perform in the Alumni band halftime show (they did flags - Olivia hasn't played her clarinet in years).
Overall, we had a good time, and I got to meet some people from my wife's college past. I may even go again next year - as long as that bear mascot of their's remembers to keep it's fly zipped.
~Rob