It’s here. It happens every year, and yet it’ll always catch you off guard. It’s Sing Song.

And as the week rapidly approaches on the calendar, three categories of people start to emerge from the sea of students: the traditionals, the newbies and the wary.

To start, the traditional students are well-versed in the event. Their parents are usually alums, and their grandparents before them. The traditionals probably grew up going to the yearly show, dressed in their Sunday best with little Sing Song lashes and cheeks painted perfectly on their juvenile faces.

They know the perfect pitch to hit, they’ve been practicing since they could talk. Every time they put on that glitter and those costumes, they know they’ll be the talk of the town among the middle schoolers in the crowd. But they have a bittersweet relationship with Sing Song. When it’s all said and done, it was the best experience. And like their parents did, they’ll talk about it for the next 25 years with nothing but fondness in their tone. But during it all? Sing Song just seems like a little brother: sometimes cool and fun to be around, but mostly dragging you down and distracting you from your responsibilities, easily wearing you out in 0.2 seconds. (To continue this analogy, little brothers are cool when you both grow up and spend more time away from each other so you learn to appreciate your time together more – similar to Sing Song.)

On the other hand, there’s the newbies. They’re usually the students that happened upon ACU – alphabetical order works wonders sometimes – and decided to dive right in. They get involved in groups, count down the days to Praise Day and completely lose themselves to ACU culture in an attempt to befriend the traditionals.

They get into Sing Song thinking it’s a fun activity, just another thing on the checklist. Oftentimes, they don’t anticipate how serious it’ll be with the three-hour-long, three-nights-a-week practices, intense vocal preparation (diction, people) and some serious arm movements.

Lastly, there’s the wary. They stay so far away from Sing Song they can’t even poke it with a stick. They’re the ones that’ll ask, “Wait, when is Sing Song?” as the traditionals rip their hair out in frustration. In fact, they didn’t even know Sing Song was a thing until about 33 percent of the student population started walking around with strange glittery costumes and bows in their hair after class hours. It’s not necessarily their fault, it’s just not their thing.

Admittedly, these three categories are grossly exaggerated observations of ACU students over the years and the multiple reactions to Sing Song. Not all stereotypes are applicable to students, or a student may identify with more than one of these categories. This isn’t perfect, because it’s the week before Sing Song and despite any given individual’s level of involvement in the event, no one has the time to sleep.