What are we talking about today?

I'll get back to theme days once I find a groove of posting regularly. In the meantime, most of my posts are about some variation of books, bikes, buses, or Broadway. Plus bits about writing, nonprofits, and grief from time to time.

This blog is mostly lighthearted and pretty silly. It's not about the terrible things happening in the world, but please know that I'm not ignoring those things. I just generally don't write about them here.

16 September 2010

Blue & Gold are Still Better

I went to orientation the week before the semester started, as I mentioned before. And we watched a video that encouraged integrity, not just while we are at UT, but for the rest of our lives; it was actually a well-done and inspirational video. It began with "We have an anthem," and included bits (spoken) of the university song.

So, going into Gone to Texas, I knew some of the words, although all I really remembered was that it begins with "The Eyes of Texas are upon you" and ends with "'Til Gabriel blows his horn." And knowing those two bits, I was expecting a really cool song, on par with some of the high school songs we've heard over the past few years.

BTW, is it weird that my high school only had one song? Schools down here have a school song and a fight song, but GCHS only has one that serves as both. I don't know if that's a Texas thing, a southern thing, or if it's a nationwide thing and we just didn't participate. Regardless, the school songs I've heard down here really are like hymns, and I was expecting more of the same from my university.

So, Gone to Texas began with a girl singing "The Eyes of Texas", and I wasn't listening too closely, because I was getting Chad & I some water and was dodging people to get back to my seat, although I did think, "Hmmm, that tune sounds familiar."

Before I could place it, though, I got back to my seat and Chad was singing the second verse... of "I've Been Working on the Railroad." Yep, that's my school song. You have got to be kidding me.

Chad did a little research and apparently one of the sites he ran across says that the tune started out as an insult to UT (edited to add: Apparently it was an insult to the then-UT president, not the entire university), but in truly Texas fashion, the then-authorities embraced the insult as a compliment and it stuck. Sigh. All the really cool words in the world can't fix that tune.

So, yes, I am disappointed by my school song. As we left that evening, they were playing it again and everyone was singing along, and I told Chad, "I should have gone to Notre Dame."

'Cause their song rocks.

2 comments:

Paula said...

It was kind of weird for me too. When I came to Anderson, we have a school song and then the Anderson Anthem. So, that was different.

Su said...

Is GC just weird, do you think? Or do most high schools in IN only have one song?