Parades!

(top photo) The Doniphan High School Marching Band (Photo by Mike Barton) (bottom photo) The float from J.A. Ashby VFW Post #3485 in Doniphan (Photo by Albert Morrow - Quartermaster)

Before you stopped to read this column, maybe you flipped through the pages of this paper searching for and enjoying parade photos. Labor Day seems to kick off a parade season. Ahead we have the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade in New York. Who says adults can’t still enjoy oohing and ahhing as the huge balloons go by on TV? Then we have live, local lighted Christmas parades, followed by the televised Tournament of Roses in California. Scattered among the biggies we might have school parades.

I remember several years getting released from classes to watch one kicking off spirit week before homecoming. Those were great as long as kids assembled ‘real’ floats during after-school hours - making it a creative collaborative activity to show off school pride - instead of getting released from classes the hour before to attach balloons and crepe paper streamers willy-nilly to pickup trucks. Any excuse for a parade is not necessarily a good thing.

Parades with purpose and planning are a sight to behold, with small-town productions topping them all, in my opinion. I can’t explain the lump in my throat when the flags go by. The lump returns as a school band approaches. Who cries during a parade? I do, that’s who! Though I’m not a fan of piercing noises, horns and sirens signal the parade has started way before it comes into view. Anticipation surges. Drum beats, hoops and hollers of kids chasing candy, the excited waves as float riders spy family and friends on the curbside are all part of a community coming together in a spirit of fun and camaraderie.

Smiles are everywhere. For a brief spell, what might divide us in invisible.