Mustangs, Look-outs, Bouffants and Gooblygock!

          "Don't think about those floats! Don't call any girls! Don't be hanging around that Dairy Bar." I settled in behind Billy Barksdale and Scotty McCullar. Coach Carroll Smith was just getting started. "I tell you men, this Homecoming stuff is poison cheese! It will get your mind off the game! You take a little bite and you're gone! We don't care who the queen is! This whole Homecoming pageantry gooblygock was invented by the Huntingdon High Mustangs to get your focus off the game!"

           Scotty whispered something about Huntingdon not being that smart. I shifted my weight to the other foot and wondered if Coach would get through in time for me to call Ruth Ann Wiley and find out when we were meeting to work on the float. "The game is the only thing that matters! I've seen the girls in this town. Men, those faces would make a freight train take a dirt road!" Coach Smith was relentless. And this was only Monday! "You've got to get your minds right! Football is not a game for float builders and pencil necks! Riding them Mustangs into the ground is the only thing that matters. You won't remember past next week who the Homecoming Queen is-you will remember the score of this game forever! Don't eat that poison cheese.."

           The sophomore class float was being put together in the back of the school shop building. We were actually trying to do a real float this year. We had won third place the year before by simply tying a few red and gray streamers onto Mary E. Pendleton and running her in the parade between the Carroll County mini-dancers and the FFA wagon.     

           We were making a "semi" corral out of old barn wood, chicken wire and cardboard sheets. We had already secured one of Mr. John Charles Sasser's horses. The plan was simple, and brilliant! We were going to paint Pam Collins in our school colors and have her wrestle the horse during the parade. Pam wasn't the biggest girl in our class but she had outlasted everybody in the big fight up at the Skyway Grill back in July. Besides, we figured she only had to throw the "mustang" down and stomp on him one time just as the float moved by the judge's stand up in front of the U-Tote'em Grocery Store.

           Tuesday's practice was the hardest we'd had all year. Coach Smith worked himself into a frenzy. I broke my nose, cracked two ribs and got poked in the eye. And I was just holding a dummy "simulating" a Mustang inside linebacker. The more Coach yelled, the harder Bobby Roberts hit me! A third-string, sophomore dummy holder will prepare you for the ups and downs of life like nothing else on earth! And I had a front row seat for the "poison cheese" lecture after practice.

           We'd post look-outs around the shop building. If Coach Scott caught us working on a float, he'd run the whole team until we were walking on our tongues! The corral looked pretty solid..if the horse wasn't wild or Pam didn't have one of her tantrums. Ricky suggested we put a goal post at one end so Pam could kick the horse over it but that notion died for lack of a second.

           Wednesday's practice was very intense. I broke a couple more ribs and got a concussion. I was so dazed I missed most of the "focus on the Huntingdon mules and not the poison cheese of Homecoming" finale. Thursday afternoon's practice was just a quick "run through". It was also hair day. We raced downtown as soon as the last whistle blew and positioned ourselves on the town square side of Broadway Street opposite Phillips Style Center. Clyde Phillips could do wonders with women's hair. We'd pour peanuts into a coke and sit back and wait for the show. 1963 was the beginning of the bouffant hair do. And every aspiring Homecoming Queen and junior attendant wasn't about to get "out haired" by an opponent. 

           Maudie Mallard came out of that beauty shop with hair out to here! I kid you not! It looked like tumble weeds on both sides with a bramble bush on top. Her mom couldn't get her in the car. They had to tie her on top. Charlotte Melton went in with her hair slicked down and stuck to her face. It didn't take Clyde more than an hour or so to grow that mane into a nesting area for the entire bald eagle population! Terry Harrison swore that Mr. Clyde had a special pump that blew up each individual hair. A gust of wind caught Judy Faust just as she stepped on the sidewalk and she had to grab a light pole to keep from flying off!

           The parade was pretty good for our little town. Mr. Aaron Pinson in the police car led the way. Bobby Ridley had fire engine No. 1 polished up and shinning for the occasion. The senior float had the obligatory giant Tide and Cheer boxes with "wash out the Mustangs" spelled across the sides. The juniors had a big Rebel whipping some papier-mâché horses out of his path. Pretty good but no moving parts... I believe we had this thing in the bag.

           I could just barely see our float from the player's wagon. We all heard the commotion when we made the curve up by the Baptist Church. I don't think Mr. Sasser sent over his tamest horse. Or maybe Pam was having a bad day. The horse wouldn't stand still and be "thrown" by no big haired girl. Pam got mad. By the time they reached the City Café a full fledged fight was going on. They were stomping, kicking, ranting and screaming when they passed the Ben Franklin Store. Pam had that horse by the throat and was squeezing the life out of him when he bolted!

           The judges didn't' see nothing but an empty corral with a busted fence with some red streamers and horse hair hanging on it. As Pam and El Diablo thundered off into the sunset Scotty turned to me, "I believe they've both been feasting on that poison cheese."

                 Respectfully,

                      Kes