Homecoming Weekend and Opening Night!

 This weekend was my first real homecoming at ONU, and it was so much fun. Not only was it filled with so many fun homecoming activities, it was also my very first opening weekend of my first musical at ONU! The weekend leading up to homecoming weekend, was an insane tech week filled with rehearsals from six to midnight every night. While it was exhausting, I could feel the energy from the entire cast and it was ready to perform. Most of us in the cast have not performed in over a year, and my last show was senior year of high-school right before Covid hit. I think because everyone hasn’t performed in so long, everyone was extra excited to have a live audience. Friday night we opened our show to an invited dress rehearsal, with a small audience of about 50 people. Saturday morning I woke up early to get myself to the homecoming parade. I went into the Starbucks, but it was completely packed out of the door and I didn’t want to miss the parade coming down the road. I used the parade as my live tweeting assignment, but the Ada WiFi let me down just a bit. Some of my tweets wouldn’t post from Mainstreet, but once I walked closer back to campus they all started to post. It was so exciting to see Ada packed with so many people, and it was a much bigger parade than I thought it would be. After the parade I went to Buckeye East, which was covered in Beauty and the Beast decorations, and they were even selling custom made Beauty and the Beast t-shirts! They don’t have any direct connection to the show, but decorated because their grand daughter is such a big fan. They seemed excited to have a group of the cast members coming in, but we might’ve been even more excited to get a t-shirt and some coffee. During the day I went to the activity tent, to collect my tuition back one free polar bear stress ball at a time. I even got to make a cute ONU tote bag! I stopped at the football game, which is very out of character for me. I don’t think I’ve been to a football game since freshman year of high-school. I made it until halftime, and then went back to my room to take a power nap before our opening night show that night. We had a sold out house, and the show went great. Excited for the next week of shows and maybe even another football game?