Well, first, you must understand that my high school mascot was a Honker. (Stop laughing!) A Honker is a Canadian Goose. (You're laughing again. Please cease and desist!) I never knew there was anything odd about our mascot, even though all the other schools in our area or sports league had tough sounding mascot names--tigers, Indians, cougars, warriors, Vikings, etc.
It wasn't until I started college that I found the mention of Honkers was a source of laughter. Had I aspired to be a stand-up comedian, this would have been a great start to my comedy routine, but I was serious and then embarrassed by the reaction. I soon learned to hide the fact that my team was represented by a Canadian Goose, by avoiding answering the question whenever a bunch of my dorm mates or sorority sisters talked about their high school experiences. I found that spilling food or drink on myself (or exclaiming "Potty break!") gave me an excuse to leave "the area" until the discussion had turned to something I wouldn't find humiliating. No one in my group of friends ever made the connection between sloppy food handling or a small bladder and the discussion of high school mascots. Whew!
When I would return home to visit family or for a class reunion, I would be in good company and could say "Honker" all I wanted and no one would laugh.
I returned home four years ago to be here for my parents, who were elderly and had no other family nearby. It was a good move for a lot of reasons. One is that I had a chance to spend time with my father every day for the first two months--I was job hunting at that point and had ample "down" time to spend with him--and we talked about everything. I learned about his thoughts, his likes and dislikes, his aspirations, his disappointments, his opinions in more detail that I ever would have on a "vaction" trip home. I thoroughly enjoyed our evenings after dinner, sitting on the front porch listening to his stories, his memories, his philosophy of life. This two-month period had even more meaning when my father became ill shortly after I started work and was in a facility from that point until his death last year in March.
But another reason I am glad I came home for these four years is that I was able to reconnect with several of my "girlfriends" from high school. They were my friends then, and even though we weren't in continual contact over the last 42 years and only saw each other at reunions every five years, they were still my friends when I moved back to Yuba City (which I affectionately refer to as Honkertown). Over the past four years, we have lunched together every six weeks or so. We worked together on our 45th year reunion held this past October, and we still share more in common than not. When we get together, we are both teenagers in the 60s and moms and grandmoms in the year 2008. We care for each other as we care for aging parents who are afflicted with physical disease and mental deterioration. When we had lunch today, I told my friends that I was leaving YC soon, and the reaction was what I would expect from friends--their disappointment that I would no longer be part of the lunch club or the occasional dinner and a movie. And then the next reaction was "What can we do to help you with your move?" No hesitation. No caveat. Just offers of help, genuine ones. I knew I could count on my friends, my Honker friends the same way we counted on each other when we walked the corridors of our high school for the last time back in 1962 and bid each other good-bye as we headed off to college, off to work and off to what life offered. With my Yuba City friends, I don't have to hide who I really am. I can be a Honker and it's a good thing. And saying the mascot name out loud makes me smile, not because it's funny, but because it represents the best thing anyone can have in life--friends who love and care for each other. And isn't it interesting that the Canadian Goose is a bird know for its fidelity for life. This characteristic holds for my Honker friends too. So, while the cougars and the Vikings and the warriors and tigers are all fearsome. My high school mascot (funny as it was and is to some people) stands for something far beyond sports and high school and winning games. It means that, when the crowd stops cheering, the games are over and the high school hallways are empty, we will still hail to the "Brown and Gold" and continue to be there for each other, win, lose or draw.
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3 comments:
i've never been ashamed to be a cougar until now...can I be a honker, too?
Sorry, I think Honkers have become so sensitive about their name and concerns that someone might infiltrate our band of wingedness, tell the whole world for a good laugh and then leave us abandoned, dejected and honking in the wind that they require residence in Yuba City for at least 3 years before accepting an adoption application. So I guess you'll have to remain an "ashamed" cougar. Perhaps your medical insurance will cover the therapy necessary to help you deal with such a terrible fate.
GO COUGARS!
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