"I love a parade, the tramping of feet,
I love every beat I hear of a drum.
I love a parade, when I hear a band
I just want to stand and cheer as they come."
-- Arden & Ohman, "I Love A Parade"
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| Sousaphones in a parade 9-18-14 |
"If you're not in the parade,
you watch the parade.
you watch the parade.
That's life."
-- Mike Ditka
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| Kids waiting for parade candy 9-18-14 |
Seriously, I do.
This weekend is homecoming in our little town, and yesterday was the traditional homecoming parade.
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| Tiger mascot on a float 9-18-14 |
Homecoming king and queen candidates rolled past in fancy cars.
The football team rode on a flatbed truck and tossed candy to the little kids (and the big kids) lining the parade route. (I got two Crunch bars!)
Parents drove vehicles pulling trailers transformed into funky, precariously built floats, competing for best in show. One had actual live baby pigs on board. I'm not sure why, exactly. But live baby pigs!
Where else but in a parade?
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| Senior class parade float 9-18-14 |
It's kind of hard to watch a live parade and not feel good.
And it doesn't have to be a humdinger, big-city, Macy's Thanksgiving Day kind of affair.
A small town rinky-dink parade like ours will do the trick quite nicely, thank you very much.
It cracked me up how people lining the parade route carried out full conversations with the teachers, parents, coaches and other locals who were driving the cars and trucks that pulled the floats and carried the various sports teams and cheerleaders.
You can't do that in New York City.
Our town has two parades a year. At homecoming, and during our annual summer festival in July.
The summer one is pretty lame. But still, it's a parade. And a lame parade is better than no parade.
Parades are kind of like pizza. Even when they're bad, they're still pretty good.
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| Football team tossing candy in a parade 9-18-14 |
(*Note to candidates: You want my vote, give me KitKat bars, not a fucking brochure.)
But I digress.
The simple fact is, parades are fun.
Parades are positive, and hopeful, and celebratory, and silly, and cohesive, and noisy, and colorful.
Whether it's a homecoming parade, a Thanksgiving parade, a gay pride parade, a Rose Bowl parade or a Fourth of July parade, parades are always about celebrating something good or making something better.
A parade literally stops traffic and shouts "Hey everybody! We're in this together, so we might as well make a party of it."
Sounds good to me.
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| Marching band 9-18-14 |
