All 4 Uses

intervene
in
Dreamland
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"There was a vote today, and everyone but me was in favor of a confrontation about your level of serious commitment to the school and the squad."
... A cheerleading intervention. Just what I needed.
Chpt 8 *

intervention = unwelcome involvement
She glanced again at my father, as if wanting him to intervene, but he already had his coat and was heading to the aisle.†
Chpt 8
What kind of full contact I could expect at the slightest intervention.†
Chpt 10
The cheerleading intervention, I thought, looking around me at all those perky faces, staring at me flatly as if I was a specimen about to be slapped on a slide.†
Chpt 10

Definitions:

(1) (intervene as in: intervened in the war)
the process of getting involved to influence an outcome
The exact meaning of intervention can depend upon its context. For example:
- "intervention program for at-risk youth" -- a process of trying to influence the direction of someone's life
- "medical intervention" -- action taken to improve a medical outcome
- "military intervention" -- interference by a government in affairs of another government (in this case to interfere militarily)
- "had a family intervention" -- an organized meeting of family members to encourage someone (who is often surprised) to recognize and work at solving a problem such as substance abuse
(2) (intervene as in: in the intervening years)
something between two other things -- especially the passage of time between two events
(3) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)
Much more rarely, intervene can mean:
in various senses, including:
- to verbally interrupt -- as in "Not now!' she intervened."
- to be physically between -- as in: "You can't walk from one hill to the other because an impassable river intervenes."