“Arise, arise, Riders of Théoden!

Fell deeds awake, fire and slaughter!
spear shall be shaken, shield be splintered,
a sword-day, a red day, ere the sun rises!"

Saturday was a red day. Stalwart shield maidens arose in their flamboyant gladiatorial war skirts and vibrantly colored tops, armed with flashing pom-poms and crowned with ornate oversize bows to clash above the painted hardwood on a drab gray foam battlefield in a fierce no-quarter contest of talent, skill, and will. Fell deeds indeed; heroes fell. Hopes fired and dreams slaughtered. Wills were shaken. Hearts splintered. A glory day, a red day, the sun rises on new champions!

In other words, Saturday was the state championship cheerleader competition. Among the tremendously talented athletes, in one division two teams stood out: the blue team and the red team. Blue, the returning champions, may have been the best team in any division in the state; the red team had imbibed of the sweet succulent vintage of victory in the past; they returned to the battlefield with a thirst for that transformative taste of triumph. Every other team yearned to garner those same laurels but only one had a chance to topple one or both of the titans. The fantastic fight and strenuous struggle to vanquish competitors and capture the title played out throughout the afternoon and evening upon the gray mat.

At the end, after the battlefield with its invisible wreckage of damaged dreams, ghosts of wounded pride, and memories of hallowed heroes had been rolled up and removed from the hardwood, the shield maidens gathered to await the casualty count. Most of them knew that they had taken wounds but hoped that they had given as good as they had got and then some. These were the moments of inner tension, the battle with the turmoil within, self-doubt, apprehension, and a recollection of how superbly the other competitors had performed. Would the blue team walk away with that title that seemed theirs for the taking in spite of the best efforts of the other contenders? It seemed so as the various categories within the competition were being announced. In the three events that determined the championship, blue took two firsts; red had a first and a second. Blue was headed toward a repeat victory. If blue took first or second in the final announcement, they would walk away once more with the championship trophy. It seemed a foregone conclusion...until the moment when the voice introduced the blue team as the third place team in the event. 

A sudden uncertainty reverberated through the scene as if a grand hammer had struck the gong of possibilities. Could red reach the victory crown or had blue still finished ahead? As the announcer gave the second place finish in the event to the spoiler, a brightness dawned upon the red team as of the first light on the fifth day at Helm's Deep; they could win; they could win it all if they finished first in the event. They would have two firsts and a second against blue's two firsts and a third. A mighty grasp  of Fate's unseen hand gripped the throat in that limbo between the ecstasy of triumph and the dark despair of defeat. Hopes longed to fly skyward on victorious wings but remained chained to the leaden possibility of disappointment.

The proclamation of red as the event winner dissolved the chains of doubt. Red soared to victory, to triumph, to the pinnacle of success. Red had seized the championship by virtue of hard work, skill, dedication, luck, and willpower. Blue (as well as other teams) had all those things as well in as much abundance. Somewhere along the way little things made the difference. Little things add up--there are a lot of little things. They say, "Don't sweat the small stuff," but it's the small stuff that determines those narrow margins of victory between champions of the highest caliber. Can you calculate ability by the blister, skill by the sweat-soaked shirt, or talent by the teardrop? No magic formula can render the intangibles that coalesce to make champions anymore than a hammer can forge a cloud. Although there can only be one champion of the day, every competitor wins a bit of courage, a ration of character, and whiff of victory's aroma for having struggled and strained to reach for the prize.

My time as a Scalosian

Before I get to the main story: The first proofreader has completed the read through of Smoke, and pronounced it very good. She wasn't even disappointed in the ending. I would say more, but I don't want to spoil anything. Another proofreader has provided lavish praise from both herself, and her husband (I'm slightly wounded by the fact that his praise seemed to be of a surprised nature). Other comments from readers include: "Emotionally evocative," "Very good character development," "Excellent plot going on," "The descriptions are very clear." I could go on, but I don't want to boast--although I don't mind other people boasting for me.

***

"Stop talking to him!" I wanted to shout...but I didn't shout. I just said it loud enough that I could hear it; maybe the first two people in front of me heard it too; I don't know. They didn't react. Why did I care if one person talked to another? It was important. It wasn't just that I was in a desperate hurry (think Jackie Chan in one of the Rush Hour movies where he's scrambling for the detonator to the bomb that's taped inside his mouth kind of desperate hurry), I was about to miss watching my daughter perform in her team's final show at the state tournament; and I was trapped. 

I had already given my money and placed my order with the young lady who took the money and orders at the beginning of the sandwich line. She was quick, quick, I tell ya, quick at taking both orders and money. She also quickly placed the specified meat, cheese, and vegetable toppings on a plate. From that point on, everything progressed in slow motion. I'll get back to this.

The venue was one of those places that puts you through a metal detector and strip search before you enter. They weren't looking for weapons (although I think they do take those away if they find them). They were checking to make sure that no one was carrying anything to eat. Woe to the individual with a Snickers bar secreted in his pocket, or a club sandwich cached inside his coat. Possession of water was a capital offense.

After we made it through the food-free decontamination chamber, we had to find our seats. I had purchased reserved seats on-line. I had wanted to print them out. Not allowed. The reserved seat tickets could only be accessed via an app on the smart phone. As we had passed through the no-nourishment security zone, the guard had tapped the phone screen to validate the tickets. The tickets promptly disappeared. I couldn't remember the seat numbers. I thought that I did, but I wasn't sure. I went to the numbers that I thought that I remembered. There were already people in them, and they said that those seats were not reserved. We sat down in someone else's seats to be out of the way while I tried to recover the tickets on the phone. I knew they were someone else's because we hadn't been there one minute before some nice people showed up asking about those seats, wondering whether we had tickets for them. I admitted that we did not, but were only using them as a resting point while checking my phone for our actual seats. We moved back up to the area walkway. 

While I got much of the ticket information to materialize on my phone, the seat numbers remained trapped in the inscrutable ether of the nefarious app. I had my wife watch for security to see if they could help us. After a few minutes, she told me a security person was coming our way. I looked, expecting to find a hulking shaven-headed brute in an undersized t-shirt, and carrying a dumbbell and a walkie-talkie. Instead, I discovered a short lady who looked like she would've been more comfortable roaming the aisles of Wal-mart (Ooooh. New fictional setting idea: The Isle of Waal Maart--probably not). She couldn't make it work either. We thought maybe part of the problem could be the poor reception at our location. She said that her daughter could help, and that there was good phone reception where her daughter was. 

Reluctantly, I agreed to go with the woman to see her daughter. I was picturing a teenager. Nope. She was a hulking brute--not really. She was larger than either her mother or I. She was also a member of security. 

She took my phone, and said, "These tickets have already been validated."

I found her tone somewhat accusatory. "Yes," I said. "They validated them when we came in."

"Okay," she said. She did something very quickly that made the tickets appear, with seat numbers and everything. 

The seat numbers were those that I had remembered, except for being one section over. So I remembered the right seats, just the wrong section. The seats were very comfortable. We sat beside a nice couple from the other side of the state. The woman thought my wife looked familiar, but they couldn't ever put themselves at the same time and place. The man didn't say much. 

Fast forward about 5 hours. We're getting hungry; famished we were, and the nasty hobbitses wouldn't give us anything to eat. We hadn't wanted to buy anything at the 3 billion percent markup at the venue. At last I crumbled, mostly because I knew my wife needed something, even though she wasn't saying anything about it. At the break, I went in search, and found The One Ring little doughnuts with chocolate syrup and whipped cream. I didn't want those. That's all there was. I filled out a small title-loan application and received the doughnuts on the easy financing plan. My. Wife. Refused. To eat. Any. Of. Them. 

I noticed that the couple next to us had some bags of nuts. I asked the man where they got them. He told me that they got them on the other side of the stadium; there were many more food offerings over there. The break was nearly over, but I thought that I could go over there and kill a burger or something, and bring it back before my daughter's team performed--there were a few teams in front of hers; I had time. I had not accounted for Slow-Motion Man in my reckoning. 

I had chosen the sandwich line, rather than the burgers, or any of the various other splendid offerings, because I was in a hurry; it was the shortest line. I hadn't realized that the line passed through another dimension, a dimension of sight, of sound; a dimension where time stood still. No. Time didn't stand still, just the old guy who was supposed to be completing the sandwiches--he stood still. I felt like Kirk watching his crew after he had been drugged with the Scalosian water (See Wink of An Eye S3 E11). All the guy had to do was to put the meat, cheese, and vegetables on the bread (which all seemed backwards to me). To say that he moved at a snail's pace would be an understatement. I had to shave three times while I stood in line. 

So when the people who had been at the front of the line when I arrived (and by front, I mean already at Mr. Slow-Motion Man's spot), wanted to stand and talk to him after they had already received their sandwiches, I had difficulty maintaining the sweet, happy-go-lucky attitude for which I am known. I felt like John Pinette.

Eventually, Slow-Motion Man proved himself capable movement slightly faster than the shadow on a sundial. I got my sandwich, half for me, and half for my wife, along with a single bottle of water (I could't borrow enough on the second mortgage I had to take out to afford a second bottle). I hurried back into the stadium just in time to hear the announcer saying the name of my daughter's team. Great! I was just in time. 

It turned out that I was just in time to see them march off at the conclusion of their performance. Curse you, Mr. Slow-Motion Man!

But my wife was happy to have the sandwich. So I got that going for me.

I judge a competition

"It's the only sport I know of where the coach requires the team to wear makeup," I said. I knew it wasn't proper English, but sometimes I'm a rebel who likes to break the rules. She laughed at that-- the makeup observation, not the rebel thing--and had to agree. 

Saturday, daughter and her team of made up maidens, rouged rogues, painted performers, maquillaged mesdemoiselles--or, more accurately, highly talented and skilled troupe of beautiful young women--put on a spectacular display. To describe the exhibition as "super awesome" would be to damn with faint praise. 

I had never before been to such a competition. It was much more crowded than the wrestling tournaments that I used to attend with some frequency--actually it was with my son, but his name is not "some frequency."

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 Lack of knowledge about the requirements of the competition did not deter me from making my own knowing critique. I first contented myself with counting the number of participants on each team; I would tell my wife how many I had counted each time, and say something about whether I thought that was a small number for a school of that size--she was enthralled with my expertise. The team with the fewest members had 4--just under half of the student body (or bodies) for that school. ("Half of the student body" just seems morbidly wrong, perhaps giving the wrong impression of the nature of the event; it wasn't some CSI competition). The team with the most members had around 22-25 on the floor; about the time I had counted up to 20, they started their routine; it's very difficult to count them when they're racing about the floor, leaping, tumbling, bouncing, and crowding about one another. Often, they would come together like a pack of hounds fighting over a bacon-wrapped feline; suddenly, one of their members would be squirted, cartoon-like, into the air to spin, flip, and otherwise contort (like said bacon-wrapped feline in a frying pan) before landing safely in the arms of the team. (For the record, I am vehemently against the swaddling of cats in sowbelly, or any other pork products...it's a terrible waste of bacon...and very likely to result in a visit to the emergency room...I won't be trying that again).

The uniforms constituted another item on my critique list. Color: Some were too dark; some were too light; only a couple were just right. The teams probably weren't judged on their uniforms, but the color and contrast presented by the parts of the uniforms, and the pom-poms contributed to the spectacle of the presentation...and the visual spectacle was what it was all about for me. Style: I had some extremely detailed criteria in this category: Did I like it? The short version is that I liked some and not others. I could expound on that...but neither of us would be a better person my having done so. So, I won't, other than to say, that it had to do with whether the uniforms looked smart (a technical fashion term, I believe), and if they stayed in place during the routines. 

Finally, I declared myself chief judge of showmanship by critiquing the performances themselves. I judged the visual display, including how well the team appeared to know the routine; how synchronized and precise they were in their movements; how well the bases and fliers got into position; and how well the fliers and bases maintained balance and position as they went through those elevated exhibitions.

One team stood out in all of the categories that I had selected as being critical. (The number of members on the team did not factor into my judging). The actual judges must have agreed with my assessment; my daughter's team finished first in each of the routines it performed. 

You've probably figured out by now that I was attending the combined high school curling and skeet shooting championship. Maybe that wasn't it; it was something much better. Best of all, no one ate Tide pods, or tried to lecture me about the meaning of the Constitution.

It may not have been my idea of an ideal Saturday, sitting on hard benches in cramped crowded conditions, but I got to watch many talented youth perform. Their performances probably won't change the world, but the time and effort that they dedicate to the task certainly changes them for the better--and that does change the world. It was a competition. Not everyone could win. The hot, wet tears of disappointment stained many pretty faces. Tears dry; character abides.