Homecoming week at Glen Rock High School is a cherished tradition eagerly anticipated by everyone. Whether you’re a football player, cheerleader, or simply a dedicated student section participant, Homecoming is a time when students come together to showcase their school spirit. As a cheerleader myself, this experience comes with its fair share of challenges, including long practices, numerous tests, moments of tears, and just three minutes to prove ourselves to an eager crowd of students.
I invite you to join us as we take you through the exhilaration, emotions, and exhaustion that Homecoming week brings to GRHS cheerleaders.
The nerves start building early on Monday morning as we walk into the school, observing everyone’s pajama day attire. It’s only five days until the pep rally and we have four practices left. The feeling of nervousness is something shared by the entire team, and you can sense the tension throughout the day, right up until the final bell rings. With a growing pile of assignments and practice looming just under an hour away, the pressure escalates.
Senior captain Emilia Pizzillo explained, “This week, our practices have been longer and the pressure has been much higher. This has made it even more challenging to focus on our work.” Arriving at practice with determination in our minds, the entire team immediately gets to work, practicing stunts and fine-tuning our dance choreography. 3 hours flies by and the team is left dismayed wondering, how are we going to get everything together by Friday?
Tuesday feels much like the previous day, with activities including filling candy cans for the senior athletes, additional practice sessions, and a mixture of excitement and stress disguised as pre-game jitters. It’s the rollercoaster of emotions, exhaustion, and exhilaration that makes the week fly by, and before we know it, Thursday arrives.
With only one practice remaining to perfect our routine, a team dinner to attend, football players’ houses to decorate, and nearly a hundred decorated cans awaiting filling, tensions run high.
Our last practice is bittersweet. After successfully executing our routine almost flawlessly five times in a row, we decided to call it a day and get ready for the team dinner. This weekly ritual, common among athletic teams at Glen Rock High School, helps build camaraderie with shared memories and trays of penne vodka. Homecoming week’s dinner had a dynamic duo theme, and everyone paired up.
After dinner, the team split into designated cars and set out for the senior football players’ houses to decorate. Once the decorating was done, we piled back into the cars, made a mandatory stop at Dairy Queen in Ridgewood, and finally returned home. A good night’s rest, coupled with the right amount of excitement, is the perfect recipe for the night before the pep rally. Everyone deservedly went to bed at the early hour of 10:30 p.m.
Friday, October 13th, arrived faster than anyone on the team could have anticipated. Though I, too, felt a bit nervous, we all made sure to boost each other’s spirits and raise the energy level.
Captain Emilia Pizzalio reflected, “In the end, it’s all lighthearted, which is what calmed me down when I felt nervous. I knew the entire school was cheering us on (hopefully), and even if we made mistakes, they weren’t hoping for our failure. What made me even more excited was that it was my last one, and I knew I had to make it memorable since I wanted to cherish my last pep rally as something special.”
Although filled with mixed emotions, Friday went as perfectly as we could have hoped, leaving the student body in awe of our performance. In the concluding weeks of our season, it felt incredible to work hard as a team and see it pay off. GRHS Cheer forever!
