Can homecoming be a bit of a royal pain?
Contributing writer
Ten seconds are left on the clock. The auditorium is buzzing. The crowd appears to be inching forward, but as the last second ticks from the clock, a shot bounces off the rim.
Girls line up to high-five the other team for a good game and then head back to their locker room. But the night is far from over for some.
Players Erin Regnier and Scout Redger have been voted in as members of this year’s homecoming royalty. They rush back to prepare themselves for showcasing.
They primp and prepare, putting on expensive dresses, fixing their hair, and gathering their nerves to present themselves to an audience full of people and flashing cameras.
While some wait their whole lives for this moment, the same cannot be said for at least one of the candidates.
The day candidates for homecoming queen were announced, Erin sighed and jokingly dismissed the information.
The picking of royalty starts early. Freshmen watch as kids popular since middle school jump around and joke with their classmates.
Typically, students pick questionably funny athletes and seemingly flawless popular girls.
Freshmen whisper to friends how four years from now they will watch as they are crowned.
Some students regard homecoming as little more than a popularity vote. Erin, this year’s winner, agrees but follows up by saying she still considers herself honored to have been chosen.
Popularity is not always a bad thing. Alumni often go on to use their popularity in school to help others and advance their own lives.
The idea of homecoming is a lovely thing and remains such in most aspects.
Guardians and loved ones thoroughly enjoy seeing their candidates shown off and given the attention and love they deserve.
But has homecoming become too much?
While the homecoming walk does not start until after the girls basketball game, rituals commence much earlier in the day.
Girls walk into school in nice dresses, sashes marking them as “homecoming royalty.”
Erin found it “annoying.”
“The boys definitely have it easier,” she said. “The girls have to go out and buy a dress for queen of courts and a dress to wear to school.”
She noted that while girls must wear sashes, boys do not, and while girls are expected to dress up, boys can walk onto the court in less fancy clothes appropriate for church.