This year featured the first normal Blue-White game since 2019, there was absolutely no lack of hype around it. I’m not a huge football fan, so I was really just excited to tailgate one last time during my freshman year and enjoy the atmosphere. Here are my favorite memories.
1. Forgetting to throw on a face sticker before leaving my dorm
As you can see, I’m clearly sunburnt. I looked at my phone’s weather app and made an educated choice that morning. I threw on long jeans, a top with sleeves and decided to not waste the time with the sunscreen. I was silly and thought I was being smart for bringing a sweatshirt. It looked like it would rain for a little bit, and I wanted to be prepared.
Instead, I ended up carrying around a sweatshirt the entire time and burning because I thought there wouldn’t be any sun. I’m so thankful that I left my dorm without a face sticker, because I know for sure it would have burned and left a mark on my face. I really need to stop trusting the weather predictions and trust that Happy Valley goes through almost all of the seasons on any given day.
2. Running into jahan dotson and not knowing who he was
Not including a photo was an intentional choice because I, unfortunately, did not get a photo with the Nittany Lion’s star former wide receiver. I’m a Penn State student, I swear, I just lack culture. We got stopped at the gates where the football players go through the tunnel and we actually made it to the front of the gates. It was so much fun to actually watch the players come out. After the gates were opened and we could walk through, we saw Jahan Dotson right there. But of course I didn’t know who I just saw until about 20 minutes after the encounter. Being oblivious is honestly really fun.
3. frozen lemonade
I was way too excited over my frozen lemonade. It was a stupidly sentimental thing to me — the last time I had a Minute Maid frozen lemonade was four years ago on my choir’s trip to Disney World. This past week my high school’s choir and band took the trip again, since it happens every four years, and it’s been so weird to watch their trip unfold over Instagram and Snapchat.
It was really nice to have something that reminded me of a really fun moment in life while living another really fun moment. It also definitely helped me because I was dehydrated, so anything going into my body helped.
4. Photos in the stands
Hands down the coolest photo opportunity of my life. We were on the opposite side as the student section, and it really felt like we were on the field. I’ve never been that close before, and don’t know if I’ll ever be again. It was a terrible view, but it’s not like the rules from Blue-White made any sense to begin with. If you know, you know.
5. Running onto the field
Again, such a fantastic experience and such a cool photo opportunity. It’s definitely something I’ll never forget. I really ran onto the field to catch up with my friends and how many times is a person guaranteed to be able to do that? Since this was the first real spring scrimmage since 2019, the answer is there are no guarantees.
Even though I didn’t understand what was going on more than half the time, this was such a fun day. I can’t wait for all of the fall game days that I actually kind of understand the rules for.