Excessive celebration

Sigh.

I feel like Michael Corleone... just when I think I'm out, they drag me back in. I even wanted to skip this subject when my wife told me about it, but it now has moved to the top of my favorite search site on the Internet.

Sigh.

Here's the story:

A Columbus (Texas) High relay team was disqualified for one of their member’s heavenward gesture. The incident occurred in Columbus, where the track and field team was hosting a meet with the goal of qualify athletes for the state championship meet later in May.

The school’s 4x100-meter relay squad achieved just that in winning its race decisively. The anchor of that 4x100 squad was junior Derrick Hayes, who ran a particularly blazing split and celebrated the team's state qualification by pointing a finger toward the heavens.

Then things broke loose. The simple act was deemed to have run afoul of a University Interscholastic League (UIL) regulation barring excessive celebration.

Once officials at the Columbus meet determined that Hayes had violated the excessive celebration rules, the entire 4X100 foursome was disqualified and effectively barred from the state championships.

Sigh.

Now, I actually believe this is about an organization trying to stem the rush to do all sorts of things as celebration, but still. A finger toward, uh, what?

We've reached the stage, it seems, that we can't acknowledge who we think gives us all we have, we have a problem, Houston.

“He put his hand by his ear and pointed to the heavens,” Hayes’ father, KC Hayes, told a local television station. “It was a reaction. You’re brought up your whole life that God gives you good things, you’re blessed.”

You're blessed unless you offer a preference to God, then you will be persecuted. That is the message, meant or not, that this act confers.

Sigh. We've got to get a grip, soon, or all will one day be lost.