“Do you know they call it ‘HOCO’ now,” This is a text from my friend Celena, a gal I’ve known since I was thirteen. We met on a soccer field, neither of us were playing the game. In a blink, we were best friends.
I’m in a coffeeshop with my daughters Hadley and Harper when the text comes through. It’s a rainy, cold Monday afternoon, and the three of us are supposed to be doing homework. Hadley’s working on an assignment where she is supposed to write about one important life event. (“You know,” she tells me, “like a soccer game.”) Harper’s working on solving math story problems, and I’m staring at a manuscript trying to decide whether it is me, or my manuscript that’s acting like a toddler who can’t get her way, when Celena texts me about HOCO.
I pick up my phone and see a picture of her son holding a sign that requests the honor of a girl’s presence at Homecoming, but it’s now called “HOCO.”
“That is the sweetest photo ever,” I text back. “And, no, I didn’t know it’s now called, ‘HOCO.'” I click on the emoji of the old woman with glasses and a bun — I’ve been using that one a lot, lately.
“Does it bring back memories?” Celena asks.
Any work I might’ve completed is forgotten. I am now in the ’90s, wearing Keds and my drill team outfit because I’m not trying to pretend that polyester pleated skirt, and that matching sweater with the orange OP logo smack in the center wasn’t my all time favorite outfit. Ever.
“Didn’t you hire a purple gorilla to ask a guy to HOCO?” I text, giggling like I’m 16 again.
“It was King of Hearts.” (That’s the dance where the girls ask the boys.) “And the gorilla was holding balloons.”
“Classic,” I text back.
Hadley and Harper want to know what I’m laughing at. “HOCO,” I tell them. They look at me like I’ve just sneezed. They are so behind the times.
“Remember the year I had impetigo?” I text. “That was fun times.”
I’d caught the world’s most unfortunate, most disgusting, most contagious rash in the wrestling room of my high school. Impetigo spreads as fast as a high school rumor. In fact, “Callie got impetigo from the wrestling room,” had a slight but effective revision by the time school was out that day. (Drop the “ing,” add “ers” to wrestle, and get rid of “room.”)
“Remember I had to wear my own mask for our ‘Thriller’ routine we performed at half-time?”
That year, Homecoming fell around Halloween. We drill-teamers donned orange T-shirts, black leggings, our sparkling white Keds, and we each wore a black mask, a prop that, because of my unfortunate rash, we all had to be careful no one accidentally took my infectious one. I think the coach wrote my name on the inside with a Sharpie.
We danced our way through Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” that October Saturday. We walked like zombies, and we did the running man and the flying splits to the cheers and roars of the crowd. The team’s final position was a pumpkin, and we rippled our way to the gourd’s death as Vincent Price laughed his deliciously wicked laugh.
To this day I don’t remember a minute of shame or sadness I might’ve felt over my skin condition or the rumors about it, but I can hear the crowd, feel the football field’s divots under my feet, and I can feel the pulsating beat of the music in my soul. I have never felt so at home with myself than when I was dancing.
I am thankful for the mini reunion Celena and I had on this rainy, new fall eve. She reminded me of the many mischievous, sweet, awkward, and hilarious ways we find home: in our schools, in our friends, in our first, second, and third crushes, in our sports, and in ourselves.
Try It
For this week’s prompt, write a fall coming home poem. Perhaps you want to write about a Homecoming Dance, or maybe you want to explore the ways you find home in your community this season.
Featured Poem
Thanks to everyone who participated in last week’s poetry prompt. Here’s a poem from Monica Sharman that we enjoyed.:
Everybody here knows what you mean
when you say, “The colors,” especially now,
the second day in October. They know
you’re talking about leaves turning away
from green — as in the yellows of elm and cottonwood,
the red-orange maple, the purple-red ash and aspen gold.
But only because we live here. Someplace else, where a year
is not so divided by seasons, colors
means something else — as in a knitter’s choice of skeins,
a budding artist’s paints for her work
in progress, a chef’s arrangement of aubergines
nestled against purple baby potatoes
and yams as bright as, yes, the turning leaves.
Colors — as in every shade surrounding
the second day of October, the day this year
when my mother would have turned eighty
and I remember that she loved palette words:
ecru,
chartreuse,
fuchsia,
and all the brightest reds
of the turning leaves.
Photo by kloniwotski, Creative Commons, via Flickr. Post by Post by Callie Feyen, author of The Teacher Diaries: Romeo and Juliet.
I have been a fan of Callie Feyen’s writing for quite some time but I finished this book in almost one sitting. You do not need to be a teacher to have instant admiration for her honesty, vulnerability, and true dedication to her students. She uses her own personal storytelling as the tool to teach one of the greatest stories of our time creating an instant connection to her students as well as to you the reader. If you have ever been in 8th grade, fallen in love, had a best friend, or loved reading, you will love this book. As the mother of an 8th grader, my other genuine hope is that my son will one day have a teacher as gifted as Callie. – Celena Roldan
- Poetry Prompt: Courage to Follow - July 24, 2023
- Poetry Prompt: Being a Pilgrim and a Martha Stewart Homemaker - July 10, 2023
- Poetry Prompt: Monarch Butterfly’s Wildflower - June 19, 2023
Megan Willome says
Love your poem, Monica, for so many reasons, not the least of which is that I am enjoying the aspens and cottonwoods in your state right now. Had to drive two states north to find fall!
Monica Sharman says
Welcome! Welcome!
Janice Lynch Schuster says
Would you like us to share our poems? IF so, how? I”m a patron, but I can’t recall how to sign in. What a day. Hard to think of fall when all of my flowers are still blooming here in Annapolis Maryland. If only you could see my hibiscus!
Donna Falcone says
Hi Janice! What a great question, thank you. We are so glad you’re here.
Yes, please do! You don’t need to sign in to share on Monday Poetry Prompts. Callie’s prompts here are wide open, as are many other Tweetspeak posts.! So please, share your Fall Coming poem(s) here in the comment box. Come back next Monday for a brand new Octoberish prompt.
You can find Patreon passwords on Patreon. I am pretty sure, if you see a post here that says sweet poetry you need a password, there should be a link over to it on Patreon, for members. 🙂
Welcome!
Callie Feyen says
Yes! Please submit in the comments. We’d love to read your work!
And I see you are from Annapolis! I lived in DC, Silver Spring, and Germantown. The mid-atlantic has such beautiful falls, I think.
Jason A. Muckley says
The brilliant Fall
Started out like a dream
Pumpkin spice
Apple picking
Leaf peeping
Golden aspens in the mountains
Then came the cold
Chilling to the bone
Fog hid the sun
Storms clouded
Rain stung
Days felt like long nights
Fall marks a season of dying
A season of decline
The ending
Coming home
Unwelcomed
Not on my own terms
Donna Falcone says
Jason, I’m so glad you shared your poem here. I love the way you assigned intention to nouns – clouds hid, storms clouded, rain stung. Nice. I could feel fall in this.
Callie says
Jason,
I agree with Donna – I felt a lot of this poem. I also appreciate the darker side of fall that you illustrate here. The last phrase strikes me as well, “Not on my own terms.” I have to learn that Fall enters on its own terms every year.
Thanks for sharing!
Janice Lynch Schuster says
I decided to recite my homecoming poem rather than to write it down as I have had trouble lately writing. I hope this will be OK and that others will have a chance to see it.
https://youtu.be/cMgt2TjhInQ
Donna Falcone says
I really liked the way you came to your conclusion…. which I won’t say here and give away your ending. Thank you for sharing!
Janice Lynch Schuster says
Thank you. I was in reality quite upset! But the years have taught me alternative responses!
Donna Falcone says
🙂
Callie Feyen says
I loved listening to you, Janice. I wrote down these two phrases: “noise I never understood,” and “leaves leading me to them” because they made me pause, and also smile. I believe you captured the wildness of motherhood quite well in your poem.
Jake c aller says
Rambling Man -Where Do I Belong?
I have been a rambling man
All my adult life
Grew up in Berkeley, California
Went to College in Hayward and Oberlin
During my lost year
Lost in a fog of booze and pot
Then I came back to reality
And went to college
In Stockton, California
The central Valley
Ohio transplanted to California
Then after four years in Stockton
With extended weekends
and breaks in Berkeley
I became an expatriate wanderer
Peace Corps worker in Korea
Then taught ESL in Korea
For four years
Occasionally returning to my home
But always wanting to be elsewhere
Then back to Korea
And then Seattle for four years
Driving back and forth to the bay area
Stopping off in Southern Oregon
Eventually bought a house and duplex
In Southern Oregon
Vaguely thinking we would retire there
Some day when my rambling ways were over
Then back to Korea for three more years
Then I joined the Foreign service
And my wife the military
And I wandered the world again
Always somewhere
Always dreaming of my next somewhere
Never there
As I was a permanent expat
And a diplomat to boot
Never a local
But never really felt I belong there
Or in the America
That was becoming more and more
A foreign land
The longer I stayed away
I stayed on in DC for almost ten years
Off and on
But never really felt that I belong there
I was too West Coast in my heart
And DC seemed to be
Just a place to stay
In between travels
Stayed in Thailand
Then later India
And Eastern Caribbean
And later Spain
Traveled to 45 countries
Lived in ten
And now I am retired
Still torn between
living the expat life
In Seoul, Korea
And returning to the West Coast
And occasionally back to DC
and Florida as well
And I wonder
Where do I belong
Where do I belong
Other than wherever
My wife and I end up
Neither here nor there
Half way there
And so is that my fate
Never to really belong
Never to have roots in the ground
Always wanting to be somewhere else
Always a stranger in my native land
And a stranger in my other home
Across the sea
There is no answer to these questions
As the rambling urge comes again
And I prepare to move yet again
Hoping someday I will be
Somewhere where I can stop
These rambling blues
And really be there