Homecoming, A Returning Yearly Tradition That Was Truly Missed

After a year without a typical Homecoming and almost two years without a normal school scene, Homecoming Week proved to be a very relaxing break from the “new normal” that started right before Spring Break in April of 2020. A yearly tradition to dress up for themes over a week, go to a home football game and a following “Fun Night” on Friday, and take part in the second most formal dance of the year, behind only Prom itself, on Saturday.

This year’s Homecoming Week was dubbed “Disney Days”, with all five dress-up days connected with popular Disney films. Monday’s movie tie-in was Sleeping Beauty with the familiar Pajama Day, allowing students and staff to come to school in their comfortable night time clothes. Tuesday was Lilo & Stitch, filling the school hallways with people wearing lots of Hawaiian outfits. Toy Story was the movie for Wednesday, creating two factions of cowboys vs aliens. Thursday returned to tradition with Cars being the movie for Class Color Day. Friday ended the week off with High School Musical, a day for anyone and everyone to wear all of their Bison and purple gear for Bison Pride Day.

After finishing the school week, the Homecoming football game kickoff happened at 7:00 on Friday night lasting for a couple hours with the Buffalo Bison losing to the #1 ranked Andover Huskies 18-24 after a weather warning with forty seconds left in the fourth quarter. Despite this loss, the student section of the stands were filled with purple and loud, unified chants throughout the whole game.

Some BHS students followed up the game by heading into the school for Friday Fun Night until midnight. Students had the options of ping pong, bean bag toss, spectating the volleyball tournament occurring in the gym, or playing Dance Dance Revolution or Guitar Hero. At 10:30 they opened up the doors to the Performing Arts Center for the show of the night – a hypnotist. The performer brought up fifteen to twenty students on stage to be hypnotized in an hour long show. Those that were successfully hypnotized drove their favorite cars, fished up their most wanted items, performed in a speed cow-milking contest, and other acts of the sort. After the show concluded, students continued to take part in the activities as the night neared to an end. After midnight, students went home to get a good night’s rest to prepare for the Homecoming dance the following night.

Homecoming week concluded on Saturday with the Homecoming dance, an event so popular that the line to get in the building took over an hour to reach the end. Starting at 7:00 p.m., the dance lasted for three hours with music and colored lights filling the cafeteria room. The dress code was more formal than it was two years ago, giving students a choice of wearing a tie, shirt, and pants (excluding jeans), or wearing a dress. The music was run by a DJ, playing popular songs allowing people to sing, jump, and dance along. For those that got hot, tired, or just wanted a break could head into the Performing Arts Center where Ratatouille was being played. The dance was taken part and enjoyed by many for the full three hours until it concluded.