Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 2, 1993 TAG: 9304300412
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOE KENNEDY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
In the beginning, the question was, whose hearts would they be?
The sixth- and seventh-grade candidates for the 10 spots on the squad seemed to give that little thought on the first day, a Monday. Instead, they showed an ability to live in the moment that an adult could only envy.
The teachers in charge of the session, cheerleading sponsors Debbie Wheeling and Sue Williams, hinted at what was to come by reminding the girls that they were champions just for trying out.
"It takes courage to get up in front of somebody," Wheeling said. "Be proud of yourselves for at least trying out, because we're proud of you. We're glad you're out here."
She reminded them for the first of perhaps a half-dozen times that she tried out five times for a cheerleader's position at the old Andrew Lewis High School, which occupied the same building, and made it only once. But her life didn't end. She went on to participate in sports, drama and other activities.
Divided into groups, the students hustled into the breezy sunshine for training from the five graduating cheerleaders.
Kasey Sovine demonstrated a routine near a pair of pink cherry trees not far from where the school soccer team was practicing.
"Victory! Lewis! Go-fight-win!
"Victory! Lewis! Do it a-gain!
"We're movin' through, right to the top!
"We're so hot we can't be stopped!"
The girls' spirits soared.
"I'm loud, I'm rambunctious, I'm crazy," said seventh-grader Amber Brooks, ticking off the qualities that she thought would help her make the team.
"People tell me I've got a good sense of humor - I'm just me."
Her friend, Leslie Meadows, touted her willingness to "get in front of a crowd and make a fool of myself" as her best point, while Melissa Thompson, from the sixth-grade, said she had practiced 19 days in a row, "except church days." She'd set her sights on this goal from age 4.
After an hour or so, the girls walked back into the gym, where Sue Williams told them, "We saw a huge improvement from the first 15 minutes to now."
"You're going to have to practice on your own," Wheeling warned. "Cheer in front of your dog."
The girls left the building in twos and threes, looking for their rides, showing no concern about the first cuts scheduled for Wednesday.
"I dread that day," Williams confided. "I don't like being the bad guy."
On the second day, Williams studied the roster: "No drops. My hunch was wrong."
She explained, "From just looking at the kids' faces, I thought some would [drop out]. I tell you, it's really competitive here."
In their shorts and T-shirts, the girls bubbled into the gym during the school's activity period, ready for work.
"My knees are killing me," one said.
Again they broke into groups and went outside to practice the cheer, the movements and the chant:
"L! E! W-I-S! WOLV-erines are the BEST!"
At 3:26, the school's doors opened and students poured out, some shouting encouragement as they passed the candidates, some smiling and some paying no attention to them whatsoever.
Williams watched the prospects bend and stretch, a little amazed by their seriousness.
"Half the girls here have probably been doing this since sandlot," she said. "In Maryland, where I grew up, cheering was cheering" - not as big a deal, in other words.
She explained why she would not continue as sponsor next year.
"It's too much work," she said. "It has nothing to do with the girls, but because I'm a special ed teacher, I have reports to do at night, testing we have to do, IEP [Individual Education Plan] writing and things like that - not that other teachers don't."
After the workout, the girls returned to the gym and took seats in the bleachers. They picked numbers from a gray plastic bucket to determine the order of the next day's tryouts. They joked and chattered, their nervousness beginning to show.
Then they listened to some tryout-day tips.
"Don't eat a lot of sugar or drink a lot of Coke while you're waiting - that can make you hyper," Wheeling advised.
"For those of you who don't make it, don't make a big deal out of it," Kasey Sovine said.
"Don't take a friend's happiness for bragging," her teammate, Amanda Cook, said.
Sue Williams cautioned them that, if eliminated, "You'll feel some . . . hatred."
When the girls went off to continue their workouts, Wheeling was asked how it felt not to make the squad.
"The first time was really hard," she said. "I really wanted to be a cheerleader. I had brothers on the teams, and I really loved football and basketball. It hurt every year."
She graduated from Lewis 25 years ago, in 1968, but even now, she said, when she runs into a classmate at the beauty shop or a class reunion, "There's still a hole, a little pain there."
First cuts. Wheeling and Williams examined their score sheets. They would award up to five points in each of eight categories, including appearance, crowd communication, voice control and poise.
Paper numbers were pinned to the candidates' shirts. Anxiety gripped their minds.
"My heart is coming up through my throat," 11-year-old Amanda Sowers said.
"I was seeing the words in my sleep," Mandy Shepard, a seventh-grader, said.
"I'm gonna get out there and pass out," Laura Stump said. "I laid awake in bed till 2 o'clock, staring at the ceiling."
The first team of five went before Williams and Wheeling, the preliminary judges. The next team stood in the hallway outside the gym door. The others waited in the cafeteria.
"Victory! Lewis! Go-fight-win!
"Victory! Lewis! Do it a-gain!"
They did a group cheer, a group chant and an individual cheer. When they finished, they fidgeted while Williams and Wheeling worked on their scores. Except for the insistent hum of the ventilating system, the gym was silent.
The judges dismissed the girls with thanks and sent them back to the cafeteria.
"I was trying to smile and my smile was moving, I was so nervous," Laura Stump said, after her tryout.
"I was off the walls," Aimee Barber said.
"I'm kind of glad it's over," Whitney Wells said.
But it wasn't over. Just before 5:30, the girls were summoned to the gym. They sat on the first row of the bleachers, each hoping for her number to be called. Those who heard their numbers squealed. Those who didn't took it hard.
When she realized her number had been passed, one girl turned her face to the wall and sat that way until the list was concluded. Then, in tears, she ran from the gym to the cafeteria, where Frances Arnold, a jayvee cheerleader from the high school, grabbed her by the shoulders and said, "Don't ever give up! Don't ever!"
Others embraced, in happiness and grief.
"Andrew Lewis would not have a squad unless people were willing to come out and try," Wheeling told them. "We thank you for participating."
Some smiling, some crying, they walked off with their backpacks slung over their shoulders. Outside, parents waited for the news.
Tyler Overstreet arrived at the fourth day of practice with a smile. But three of her friends got cut, and that concerned her. One went home and cried, she said. "That's probably what I would do."
Four or five of Betsy Harger's friends didn't make it. "They were, like, crying and stuff and really upset," she said.
A day later, they were somewhat better, "but they didn't like to hear about cheerleading."
Jaymi Curtis said her mother, aunt and grandmother were joyous at her news. Her friends were still suffering.
"I don't like to talk about it when they're nearby, because it makes them feel bad about not making it," she said.
These were some of the 27 survivors, whose early solicitousness of their friends' feelings gradually yielded to excitement.
Debbie Wheeling and Sue Williams said yes, they had misgivings about choosing 10 girls plus an alternate for the cheerleading squad, while the others got nothing.
Some schools have pep squads, they said. There, every student who has the grades gets a T-shirt and the right to sit in a group and do the cheers along with the cheerleaders.
"I'm not to sure that's not a bad way to go," Wheeling said. But, she noted, "This cheerleading stuff is deep in the blood of Salem."
It was an easy day. Girls like Michelle Bowles tried to save their voices. Others rested their muscles. If they worried about the finals, they didn't show it. They savored their success.
There would be more disappointments soon enough. The unlucky ones would get over it, Sue Williams said, but not right away.
"It'll hit hard at the first game, when they see the girls in their uniforms."
Williams and Wheeling had news on the day of final cuts. They'd talked to Jerry Campbell, the principal, and he had agreed to establish a pep club for those who didn't make the cheerleading squad.
The school would provide free T-shirts, free admission to games, club meetings to learn the cheers and a chance to make banners for the games.
"He's a good man," Wheeling said.
The judges arrived. Carrie Poff, a sixth-grade social studies teacher, cheered in high school. In seventh grade, she got cut. Tryouts made her "major nervous - just really scared," she said.
Terri Blankenship, a seventh-grade science and social studies teacher, cheered on the jayvee and varsity squads at Glenvar High.
"The first year I didn't make it, and it killed me," she said. "I know what they're going through."
Suzanne Holdridge, an eighth-grade math and science teacher, cheered at Northside junior and senior highs. She and Poff said they'd be interested in sponsoring the new squad.
Before the competition began, Wheeling offered some advice to the contestants.
"Be happy," she said. "It won't matter 10 years from now. Enjoy today. Live it fully."
The first group went out. In the cafeteria, the other girls began their long wait. Jaymi Curtis sat on the floor, so nervous her eyelids twitched.
Her mother had told her, "If I make it, she'll be really proud of me, and if I don't make it, she's going to be proud of me because I tried."
"My mom said, `You'll do OK because you always do OK,"' Amber Brooks said.
"My dad brought me roses and my sister brought me candy and a balloon," Aimee Barber said. "Today during school all my friends wrote me notes, and a friend found me a four-leaf clover outside today.
"Last night I was praying in my bed."
Groups of three came and went. When the door opened, shouts from the gym rang out:
"L! E! W-I-S! WOLVerines are the BEST!"
"I think I did pretty good," said Amy Rose, who had worried about her voice.
"I messed up," said Jamiria Johnson, who sat in a chair by herself. "I'm not gonna make it. I know it."
Amber Brooks and Leslie Meadows sat cross-legged on the floor, rocking and holding hands.
About 5 o'clock, the graduating cheerleaders gathered around Amy Andrews, their teammate, who had begun to cry, saying it was the final time she would wear her blue-and-white uniform. Kasey Sovine blinked away tears.
When the last of the girls returned, the judges took their time studying the scores. They sent word to have numbers 17, 21 and 23 come back and try out again - supposedly because of a tie, but actually so they could pick one to be the alternate.
Finally, Debbie Wheeling came in and read the winning numbers: 1-2-6-11-12-16-23-24-25-26.
For an instant, winners and losers acted stunned. Then pandemonium broke out, mainly in the form of tears.
One girl stormed across the cafeteria, tearing up her number. She grabbed her books and ran out the back door.
Jamiria Johnson looked incredulous. She asked Wheeling, "Did you really say 6?"
Girls hugged each other. Mindy Caldwell, the alternate, acted angry and disappointed - for a little while, at least.
"Any one of you could be cheerleaders," Wheeling was saying. "You are all that good."
But no one was listening.
The new squad - Aimee Barber, Lauren Wheeling, Caroline Allred, Tyler Overstreet, Alicia Holliday, Jaymi Curtis, Michelle Bowles, Laura Cannaday, Jamiria Johnson, Amanda Sowers, plus alternate Mindi Caldwell - lined up in front of the judges in the gym. They gave a cheer. The graduating cheerleaders handed each of them a yellow carnation.
Belinda Sowers, Amanda's mother, rushed into the gym and spied her daughter, then hurried toward her, saying, "Thank you, Jesus! Thank you, Jesus! Thank you, Jesus!"
She wrapped her in a hug.
"We really prayed about it," she beamed, moments later. "This was a dream of hers."
Postscript: Twenty-six girls showed up for the first Pep Club meeting last Tuesday afternoon. Wheeling and Williams welcomed them and outlined what participation would involve. The school would provide T-shirts and free admission to all games.
During weekly meetings, the girls would learn the cheers, design posters and make banners to display at the games.
With their voices they would support the Wolverine cheerleaders and athletes - or, as Wheeling put it, "Make lots of noise and be obnoxious to the other team."
The group decided to elect officers at its next meeting. Members voted to allow rising seventh-graders to run for secretary and treasurer and rising eighth-graders to run for president and vice president.
Someone suggested that maybe they could have a pizza party, which met with general approval. Others suggested a few basic rules.
Then Bria Daulton, who took a leading role, asked, "In pep rallies, will we be noticed, do you think?"
Wheeling assured her they have would a prominent position. Everybody cheered.
by CNB