His Majesty

Sometimes I tell Daniel he's a drama king.  (And then he always asks me what that means.  Do you know how hard it is to explain that concept in your second language??)  He just cracks me up sometimes with his range of facial expressions and his ability to exaggerate.  ("Mommy, I'm STARVING!  I haven't eaten in HOURS! WHEN are you going to finish dinner?  I'm about to die of hunger!")

Now, he has a new claim to royalty:

In case you can't read his sash, it says Homecoming King!  Yes, his eighth grade class (of about 200 students!) decided that, white hair, broken English, vision aids, quirky behavior, and all, Daniel was the classmate they most wanted to represent their school spirit.  We are very proud of him!  We think he is pleased, too.  In good old-fashioned Chinese humility he hasn't said much about it, but he hung his crown up on the wall near his bed and he went off to school the day after homecoming wearing his rosette and his little sparkly pin that says "Court" on it.

It was quite a contrast from the afternoon of the homecoming event, when he insisted that he didn't want to go, and he definitely wasn't going to change his clothes.  (At the time, he was wearing a traffic-cone-orange T-shirt...I'm sure that would have made quite a splash on the field!)  I'm not sure why he goes through the motions of sabotaging himself before big events.  Nerves, maybe?  Anyway, when the time came to go he changed into his dress pants and button-down shirt without protest.  He even submitted to a belt.  We teased him that he ought to wear a tie, which brought out all his drama king talents.  He didn't know that Tim doesn't actually own a tie that matches that striped shirt, so he was in no real danger.

Once we got to the football game, Daniel took off with his friends.  I got a picture of him at one point completely surrounded by fashionably-dressed girls, apparently all fussing over him (most of his friends are female--and most of the friends he talks about at home were also part of the homecoming court).  Unfortunately it was already dusk, so while the photo will help me remember the moment, it wouldn't convey much to any of my Dear Readers if I posted it!

When halftime came, the cheerleaders made a triumphal arch down the middle of the field, and the members of homecoming court passed through it with all due pomp and circumstance while their names and their parents' names were announced to the crowd.

After everyone had come through and taken their places in front of the arch, the Homecoming Queen and King were announced (in that order).  Students had voted for the king and queen out of the three boys and three girls previously chosen as eighth grade class representatives.  It happened that Daniel's escort was chosen as queen.  She stepped forward graciously to accept her tiara, while her mother (at least, I assume it was her mother!) squealed like a teenager, jumped up and down, and ran over to hug her friend.  Then Daniel was announced as king.  I'm not sure he quite knew what was going on at that point, but he grinned real big and raised his hand to let the master of ceremonies know where he was.  Then he figured out what he was supposed to do, and went over by the queen to be sashed and crowned.

(I didn't get as good pictures as I would have liked, partly because I wasn't aggressive enough and partly because the camera's settings weren't right for the lighting conditions, and when I went to adjust them I discovered that the menu had been changed into Chinese!  Hmm, I wonder how that might have happened??  So Daniel has asked the teacher in charge of photography to load some of the official pictures onto his (Daniel's) USB, and I think we will get them eventually.)

After the football game had resumed, Daniel received many congratulations and took pictures with all of his friends, which he found already uploaded to his Instagram account when we got home.  At one point he had thought he would want to leave right after the ceremony, but in the event he was too busy socializing, and we were very happy we had made Esther take a nap in the afternoon!  She did enjoy watching the football game, climbing on the bleachers, and especially watching the cheerleaders.

The day after the homecoming game Daniel attended the homecoming dance at school.  I went, too, as chaperone.  It was a fascinating sociological experience.  :-)  Some kids danced, while many just "hung out" with friends (and large clusters of girls followed the time-honored tradition of all going to the bathroom together).  Some kids wore jeans, while I saw a few suits and dresses that would not have been out of place at a prom.  A couple of kids appeared to have come as dates, but that was the exception (and I know the school doesn't encourage it).  There were a few songs that all the kids seemed to know specific moves to.  I mentioned it to the vice-principal, and she said they actually teach those dances in gym ahead of time so that every kid can have the option of dancing and not feeling stupid when those songs come on.  I thought that was a great idea! 

I had expected Daniel to spend the evening hanging out with his BFF (the girl in the sparkly shirt in the top picture below) and her entourage, but he made the rounds of the gym, interacting with anyone he knew.  He and another boy made up some wild and crazy dance moves together; he sang along with one of the songs in company with the school custodian (who is awesome, all the kids love him!), and he even slow-danced for a few minutes with a girl that I didn't recognize.  (Don't worry, grandmas, middle school slow dances are pretty tame.  The girl puts her hands on the boy's shoulders, the boy puts his hands on the girl's waist, and they hold each other at arms length while rocking back and forth to the music.  On a couple of occasions I saw several slow-dancing couples line themselves up so that the girls could talk sideways to each other while dancing.  And I probably saw more girls slow-dancing with other girls than with boys.  (In that case, both girls put their hands on each other's shoulders.)  Apparently, at this age, it's still all about the friends!)

I was impressed how well Daniel has learned the unspoken rules of social interaction.  Last year I wanted to chaperone Daniel's dance (the one he ended up missing out on when he got strep throat) because we were worried about how he might behave.  This year, I just wanted to see what it was like and to be a resource for Daniel if he needed anything.  He did ask me a couple of times what time it was and when we were going home (he doesn't tend to like crowded, echo-y places), but he stuck it out to the end and then planted himself in the hall as a self-appointed farewell committee.  Funny boy!

A lot of people have said (very complimentary) things to us about Daniel being Homecoming King.  Honestly, I have been a little surprised how much meaning some people attached to it.  Yes, it's an honor.  We're very proud of how well he's adjusted (and how hard he's worked!), and his election is a testament to that.  But a kid with a less exuberant personality could have worked equally hard and adjusted equally well, and not gotten picked for homecoming court, yet we would have been equally proud.  So while we have gotten lots of admiring comments about Daniel recently, my most favorite one hands down was by another parent chaperone at the dance, who told me that Daniel is "a good kid" and that her three children, at least two of whom are in a younger grade than he is, think very highly of him.  If he has won the respect of kids who have nothing to offer him socially, then that suggests not just popularity but character.  And that is something that we can be very proud of!