Going to a school where there is no football team Homecoming weekend seems a bit pointless right? Wrong! During Homecoming weekend here at Stockton the Friday night lights may not have been shining, on the field but they were certainly shining elsewhere. On the evening of October 10th, Big Blue was roaring, not with the cheers of students for a volleyball or basketball game, but roaring with laughter. As part of Stockton’s Heroic Homecoming Weekend the SET Club hosted a comedy night featuring MTV’s Girl Code Nicole Byer. Having this comedy star here at Stockton was certainly the biggest event of Homecoming weekend, and in my opinion much more entertaining then a football game.
As I entered Big Blue that Friday night with a few friends, I was not expecting what I saw when I looked to the bleachers, a full house. Students had packed themselves in trying to get the best seats, and I too squeezed in like a sardine. As Nicole Byer took the stage students cheered as if it was our very own Stockton Ospreys running onto the field; they were ready for a performance of a lifetime. Byer certainly lived up to this standard. She might as well have been crowned the Homecoming Queen herself because she was the one thing everyone couldn’t wait to see. I’m pretty sure she had the whole crowd laughing, including the faculty, for an hour straight! Her set consisted of mostly her own personal comic happenings from eating french fries drunk off the ground to awkward situations with the opposite sex to interacting with the crowd, all were certainly entertaining.
Despite Byer being a fabulous form of entertainment, I believe that within her set was a deeper message to be left in our minds. This message was to be confident with ourselves despite what others see us as. Byer possesses the ability to laugh and poke fun at herself, which I think is a good quality to have because the world’s going to have their opinions, so why not be confident enough to make a joke out of them. Byer started her set off by telling the crowed how she realizes she is a, “Sassy, fat, black chick” and loves that about herself. She shared that even though many people try to get under her skin by making jokes about her size and skin color, she doesn’t care because she loves who she is and is now able to turn it into jokes making herself and thousands of people laugh. She turned a situation which could easily have gone bad into something good. She left the students of Stockton with the message to love themselves and turn negative influences into positive ones.
So who needs a football team to have a good Homecoming? Absolutely not Stockton! People bond over laughter, and that exactly what happened among Stockton students when Nicole Byer took the stage. Together students enjoyed some laughs, I laughed so hard at one point tears were coming from my eyes, but together we also learn an important lesson in life: to love ourselves and turn bad vibes into good situations. Overall Homecoming weekend was a blast, but the comedy show was by far my favorite event!