All Panther!

The Husband and I were way overdue for a date night, so on Friday we went to see the Jemison Panthers tear it up on the football field. (Incidentally, it turned out to be probably the worst officiated game I have ever seen in my whole life. Seriously, it was criminal. It was so bad that when our female youth director came to her feet screaming something about grinding the other team in the dirt in retribution, I joined right in, loudly echoing the sentiment. Thank goodness we didn't have our "Come Worship at USBC" T-Shirts on. Whew.)

We ended up taking the whole Johnson Traveling Road Show to the game instead of it being a date night, because Elaina cheered at the pre-game with the other little girls who enrolled in the cheer clinic last week. She was so excited. She had her braces tightened before the game and changed out her rubber bands to blue and white. She told the orthodontist tech, "I am blue for Auburn (her father's fault), white for Alabama (ROLL TIDE!), and Blue and White because I am aaaaallllll panther." (ha-ha!)

She had a great time, but I'm pretty sure that 'professional cheerleader' is off of the Great Expectations List in her future even if she miraculously got good enough to do it, especially after her father saw some of those dance moves. Then the varsity cheerleaders topped that performance off by dancing to a song by the Pussycat Dolls called "When I Grow Up". (You can google the lyrics if you don't grasp the problem.) I thought that the Right Reverend was going to cut loose there for a second after I told him what the song was and who sang it and what the lyrics said, but then he wanted to know how I personally knew that data, so I bore the brunt of that exchange rather than the cheer leading squad. Hmph. (Note to self: shut mouth more often.)

One time when the girls were at gymnastics class I had a woman ask me if I was concerned because the girls hadn't yet mastered the art of the round off yet. I rolled my eyes and said something about not being worried because I'm not raising Nadia Comaneci at my house; we're in it for the fun part. She looked at me wide eyed and horrified and said in a breathy voice, "But they can't ever make a cheer squad if they don't learn those tumbling skills." I turned to make sure that I had her full attention and said, "From your mouth to God's ear because the last thing I want in the whole entire universe is for my daughters to have a desire to dance around half naked in front of the student body. I can't handle that sort of pressure." That mom doesn't sit next to me in gymnastics class anymore. Go figure.

Lily provided quite a bit of comic relief at the game. The second we finished our food, two minutes after kick off, she said that she was ready to go home. (The Parents all collectively said "uh-oh" after reading that sentence.) Then the half-time show involved some high-school girls in sequined gowns who did this little dance number with props. One of the girls on the squad was a very dark-skinned African American who was stunning in that bright white sequined dress--I mean she was striking. So, Lily turns to me and points at this young lady on the field and says, "But I want to be brown too!" I said, "That's not possible." She insisted again and I explained that I am white. Her daddy is white. She is white. That's how it works. She said, little lip pouted out in the Sad Voice, "But I don't want to be white. I want to be brown too. We use mate up?"(make up) (So, when she ends up in a Ben Stiller or Coen Brother's movie, you'll know how that happened.)

Not having any response to that, I simply offered her another drink of her "coke-a-mola", which she promptly back washed half of a hot dog into. So, in summary we paid something like $80.00 to get in the stands and buy snacks for six people, to scream at some referees (and I use that word loosely), and drink hot dog-infused cokamola while watching my eight-year-old shake it like a salt shaker. What kind of date is that? Oh yea, a Johnson one.