Rock chalk

published February 23, 2012

in the Stockton Sentinel

Stockton, Kansas

Last Saturday, we spent the evening with about 17,000 of our friends, and wow! It was a blast! I call them friends, not because we personally know each other, but because we were all at the same place at the same time and for the same reason. There may have been less than twenty people there whose names I know, but for the time we were together, we were united for one purpose. And for the most part, we were dressed in similar fashion, wearing much the same color. The noise level was at times almost unbearable. At one point, the noise-o'meter registered 104 decibels, far surpassing the point where permanent damage could occur.

You see, Saturday we traveled to Lawrence and entered the shrine known as Allen Fieldhouse on the campus of the University of Kansas. We try to attend at least one basketball game each season, and this time we took our oldest son, Chris, and his wife, Brandy, who had never been to a KU game before. This was a Christmas present from Brandy to Chris, and we were pleased to be invited to join them. Actually, if I remember correctly, we kind of invited ourselves. Out of parental concern, of course. It just would be right to send our children out into such wild and crazy territory without being there with them.

So with our grandchildren taken care of by their other grandma, and our dogchild in the capable care of our friends at CVS, we headed out early Saturday morning. We wouldn't have needed to leave that early in the day for an evening game, but Brandy and I needed a little retail therapy. Downtown Lawrence was unbelievably crowded as a large percentage of the 17,000 people we were going to spend the evening with had the same itinerary as ours. The downtown stores must love home games.

Finally it was time to join the throng and head to the arena. Even though we arrived more than an hour early, there was a long line of people waiting to enter. The excitement cranked up several notches, but nothing could compare to the excitement once we had climbed to our seats, almost in the rafters. In order to find four seats together, even several months ago when we purchased the tickets, we had to settle for seats in the nosebleed section. Just slightly above the reach of the t-shirt shooter, but otherwise okay; there is no such thing as a bad seat in Allen Fieldhouse.

I know many of you wear purple and cheer wildly for another Kansas team. We watch and cheer for your team, too. You've got your "Octagon of Doom," and it's incredible. We've been to a couple of games in the octagon. One time when we were there, dressed in crimson and blue and feeling extremely out of place, most of the folks dressed in purple were still friendly to us. In the end, the crimson and blue team won, so we were dressed appropriately, after all. In all fairness, we were at Allen Fieldhouse one time when the team wearing purple won, and we were friendly to their outnumbered fans.

My husband and I don't have a vested interest in either team. Mostly, we just like good basketball, whoever is playing and whatever color they are wearing. Actually, the college we attended and Bob's alma mater, Wichita State, may come up through the ranks and beat them all! We're getting close to March Madness, the most exciting time of the year, and anything can happen. Rock Chalk.