Some bum who used to hang around the press box in Cow Town. (Photo by JohnsPhotos.net)
It’s been 44 days since I’ve seen the prairie.
Friday night brings with it the first home football game for Coupeville High School, and it will be the first one I’ve missed out on in at least a decade-and-a-half.
When the Wolves take the field to square off with Cascade (Leavenworth), the ball flying off the kicker’s foot at a few minutes after 6:00 PM, I won’t be in the press box. Instead, I’ll be in steamy, bug-encrusted West Virginia.
This blog started in 2012, and I’ve written about Coupeville athletics off and on since 1990, meaning I’ve spent many a night marinating in mid-50’s weather, one eye scanning the horizon for fog, the other for deer wandering on to the playing field.
My notebook and roster at hand, perhaps a chocolate chip cookie or three within easy reach, thanks to clock operator Joel Norris, as another chapter of small town life plays out.
There have been a handful of good CHS football teams, and a lot of mediocre ones (at least in terms of wins and losses) over the years, and yet the Friday night (or sometimes Saturday night) experience stands alone for most sports writers.
There is a buzz in the air, even during late-season matchups between teams stuck at the bottom of the league standings, as a cross section of Cow Town stuffs itself into the stadium.
Some come to watch the game. Others to see, and be seen.
Football diehards or casual bystanders, overflowing from the stands, with packs of people camped out around the track oval, on the grass, and endlessly wandering around.
Basketball is God’s Chosen Sport. Of this there can be no denial.
Others will speak of obsessions with softball, or track and field, or volleyball, or any sport played by someone wearing the red and black and white of the Wolves.
But it is football, whether it’s a clash between successful teams or struggling squads, which makes the school the most money, puts the most butts in the stands, and is the great unifier.
Arrive early, as I always have in an effort to grab a parking spot when the grabbing is good, and you can watch as things develop.
Sunlight fades — at least when you get deeper into the season — as the stands fill up. Cheerleaders congregate in small groups, then as a team, while the players begin warmups.
Young children emulate the current high schoolers, then grow up to become those high schoolers, with a new group of kids moving into place, as the never-ending circle continues.
Neighbor sees neighbor. Gossip flows. Candy is eaten (at least in the press box).
Down below, photos are snapped, as high school yearbook students make their move, or parents angle for a shot, or, sometimes, semi-pro snappers try to adjust to the shadows beginning to be cast by the stadium lights.
Mickey Clark Field is seven days short of its 50th anniversary — the first game played there came on Sept. 19, 1975 and featured a visit from Chimacum.
The Wolves will be in Granite Falls next week, but play at home tonight and home the following Friday (Sept. 26) against Cedar Park Christian-Bothell.
If I had stayed on the prairie, and not reduced my worldly belongings to what could be fit inside a duffel bag and gone to visit the nephews 2,800 miles away in late July, I would have pushed hard for the anniversary to be celebrated in some way.
Following on the footsteps of the 101-year and 50-year celebrations for CHS boys’ and girls’ basketball, respectively, it would have made for a fitting tribute to all that football and cheer have brought to the community.
Especially since 2025 also marks the 35-year anniversary of the 1990 Wolf football squad, which went 9-0 in the regular season and hosted a memorable state playoff game on a particularly blustery prairie afternoon.
Without me there to encourage (chafe) those in charge, I haven’t heard word one about the moment being publicly noted. Which is a shame.
Over the course of this blog, I’ve written 12,000+ stories, while entertaining some readers and irritating others.
It’s a legacy. Might not be a perfect legacy, but it’s my legacy.
During my time in West Virginia, I’ve come to appreciate the state. It’s a perfectly fine place, if a little too warm and buggy when seen through the eyes of someone who’s put in 54 years in Washington state.
But it’s not the prairie.
Sometimes you have to go away to fully realize what you had. That seems to be the case for me.
I miss 50 degrees and overcast. I miss the breeze off of Penn Cove.
I miss having the library, the post office, the gas station, the grocery store, my bank, and the schools all sitting about half a mile from the duplex I called home for 20 years.
I miss — or will miss later today — being one of the first ones to walk behind the elementary school, then take the steps up to the press box at Coupeville’s football stadium, everything coming alive around me.
Guns ‘n Roses mixing with the Backstreet Boys on the pre-game soundtrack, if we’re lucky.
With House of Pain’s “Jump Around” on tap to make the stands shudder late in the game and Neal Diamond forever lurking, primed to deliver the opening lines of “Sweet Caroline” as teens everywhere anticipate their moment to carry the tune home.
The air beginning to crackle, with anticipation, with a sense of community, with a town gathering, a new set of tales to be told and recorded.
Me? Tonight? I’ll be 2,800 miles away.
I can tell you the final score afterwards, maybe even tick off a few scoring plays gathered from those in attendance.
Certainly not going to pay for NFHS and its crappy streaming service for a game which will end sometime around midnight, West Virginia time.
What I won’t be able to do tomorrow is to take you inside the stadium with me, to give life to the story, from things seen and heard in person. To transport you to the prairie.
And I will miss that.
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