COLUMN: For a Macon kid, Northeast title game provided some full-circle moments

While Macon is not a small town by any definition, it can sure feel like one.

Folks from around here probably know what I mean. Any time you visit our downtown — especially at this time of year, when our massive Christmas light display draws some pretty sizable crowds — there is a very high chance you’ll see someone you know, if you’re a local.

You could see them while you have dinner at Piedmont, while you’re browsing at Fresh Produce Records or Bohemian Den, while you play Galaga at Reboot or while grabbing a drink at The Rose Room. (You can probably tell I just listed some of my preferred downtown activities).

Either way, chances are pretty high you’ll see someone you know. It’s how you know them that’s the fun part.

For me, it’s usually folks from Mulberry Street United Methodist Church who I run into. I see classmates from Central High School, too, and plenty of Mercer students — and sometimes professors, which can be a different vibe.

Running into folks is a pleasure. Seeing old friends at a bar downtown or underneath gargantuan LED-lit Christmas ornaments is kind of charming.

I did not expect to have a moment like that when I covered Northeast’s football team in the state championship last week in Atlanta.

The title game went down at the Falcons’ Mercedes-Benz Stadium, a shiny stadium of the modern era that looms large within the Atlanta skyline. There’s no small town aura to it, at least not on a surface level.

The East Macon folks brought Bibb County to the 404, man. It was astonishing. The fans packed that place out, and it was hands down the best experience I’ve had as the sports editor as The Macon Melody. That’s not an easy call, either — I’ve loved almost every second of my time as the sports guy for my hometown paper. It’s hard to pick a favorite.

But the combination of such an unlikely tournament run — one nearly half a century in the making — and the fact that it was my first football season as a sports editor made it thrilling to cover a Macon squad in Atlanta, even if they did end up losing the championship game.

There was one moment that didn’t make it into my reporting that I feel I must mention, though.

If you read my introductory column in The Melody’s inaugural issue, you know I was a band kid. Not just any band, but Central’s Sugarbear Band. The Chargers’ well-known band that got its name from an old Post cereal sponsorship was a big part of my life for a while there.

When I was on the drumline, we had several percussion instructors come in and help us learn cadences, rehearse different parts and get the hang of new techniques. I assume this was a frustrating job for them, since most of us weren’t particularly good at reading music and had to learn almost all the drum parts by ear.

Still, these dudes tended to be cool cats. I won’t go through listing them by name, but the four or five instructors and assistants we chopped things up with were a huge help for us as a drumline and, honestly, me as a student.

I had my own little full circle moment at last week’s title game in Atlanta when, as I was roaming the Northeast sideline with my reporter’s notebook in the first half, I ran into one of those percussion instructors: Cedavean Waller. Cedavean’s a great drummer, the mind behind the Macon youth involvement project Streetline and, funnily enough, the subject of an Ed Grisamore column in The Telegraph a few years back.

Cedavean was one of the instructors at Central I remembered the most. When shrimpy little Micah stuck with playing drums but struggled to hold up the snare that was bigger than his head, Cedavean gave me — not loaned, but full-on gave me — a proper snare drum strap to help properly hold up the doggone instrument so my slight frame didn’t hit the floor every time I suited up for a performance.

I spied Cedavean on the field at the game before he spotted me, and worked my way through a few coaches and photographers to dap him up. He didn’t recognize me at first, and his head cocked back.

“No way that’s you,” he said, smiling.

To be clear, I was never close friends with Cedavean — we were acquaintances, if that. But we chatted for a bit. I explained my new job as a newspaper sports editor, he told me about his gig helping out with the Northeast band, who readied themselves for the field behind him.

Then he and the Raider band took the field at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. It was a pretty neat moment. I was there covering my city and the support they received, and I got to touch base with an old teacher.

I think that’s what I’ve enjoyed so much about my work so far. As 2024 comes to a close, I’ve thought a lot about how fun it’s been to stay in my hometown and contribute to it in a unique way that Macon, in my opinion, has sorely missed in recent years.

Running into Cedavean fully cemented that, though I can’t necessarily explain why. Something about seeing a high school memory in human form just brought it all home for me. 

Cedavean asked me one last thing before he went on to help the band before the halftime show.

“You still got that snare strap?”

I don’t, in fact. I told him that I’d left it with the Sugarbear Band so someone else could get some use out of it. I think maybe that was why seeing him seemed so cool — I hope my journalism does for some folks what Cedavean did for me when I was in high school.

So, that said, hopefully my sportswriting this year has been useful for you, whether as a charming distraction or as a piece about a friend or kid that you put on the fridge with a magnet. Whatever the case, thanks for reading this year. It’s been a pleasure.