The wonder years

I know a lot of people would call me crazy for this, but I would totally relive high school. I remember my junior year wasn't my favorite, although I can't really remember why, but I had so much fun in high school. I had the coolest friends, I didn't have to worry about work or how I was going to pay bills, and my mom still did my laundry. Plus, homework in high school was much easier than it was in college.

I got my last two years of high school P.E. waived by filling out a form that said I needed time for classes that would better prepare me for my college education when the truth was I was just sick of playing basketball. And when I say "playing basketball," I mean running back and forth on the court, wondering how I would get rid of the ball if someone dared pass it to me.

I hated swimming in P.E. too, so in tenth grade, I had my mom write a note to get me out of the swimming unit. In the note, she kind of exaggerated the pain and fatigue swimming caused me, and my fat P.E. teacher told me I was just out of shape. Maybe so, but you didn't see her eagerly jumping in the pool to practice her survival skills, treading water for twenty minutes in her jeans, only to remove them and inflate them as a life preserver while struggling to keep her nose out of the water. Yes. I did that, and now I know that if I'm ever in the middle of an ocean with only my pants for a life preserver, I'm going to drown. I spent the rest of the swimming unit walking the perimeter of the southern-most baseball field with my fat friends whose mothers had written them notes.

That same year, I had a health teacher who told us that her 70-year-old parents still had sex. For some reason, that statement was burned into my teenage mind. We watched videos about STD's and Kurt Cobain's suicide. We wore those drunk goggles and tried to walk around the room--some people seemed to have more practice than others--and there was that stoned kid in the corner who slept through the bell as the rest of us were herded out the door for second period. There was boring Mr. Bowen, a string bean of a man who one day found a decorated sign on his portable's door that read "Mr. Bonads," and Mr. Hauk with his bleached hair and fake-n-baked red skin from his after-school tanning salon job, and the creative writing teacher who only wrote stories about squirrels and gave you an A as long as you turned something in. And if, by chance, one of my high school teachers ever happens to stumble across my blog, know that I loved you for your quirkiness.

Click here to read about the time I was kicked out of driver's ed.

After school, when I wasn't watching Boy Meets World or Saved by the Bell, Megan and I would hang out at her house and listen to Blink 182, Something Corporate, and The Starting Line while we did homework or projects and ate pepperoni and cheese on Wheat Thins. On weekends we would get everyone together and have "Mormon raves" in Alex's basement or play Balderdash and Suck and Blow at Mallorie's house. Sometimes, I would go over to Mallorie's, and we would talk to strangers on AIM, which my mother would have killed me for if she had known. Don't worry, Mom. We never gave out personal information.

There was the "Roll Out" music video (which somebody needs to find, by the way) where Kirsten and I pushed Alex around on a scooter and pulled Monopoly money from our turtlenecks. And then there was that snow day where we walked all over the neighborhood, making snow angels in random yards. We made snowmen with blue Mohawks at Melanie's house, and Jake threw a snowball at a car. The guys slammed on the brakes and left the car running in the street while they yelled in Derek's face, assuming him the culprit. Derek said nothing. Chelsea told them to watch their mouths.

And, oh, my gosh, all those years at girl's camp... Amazing.

Yeah. I would totally relive high school.

I don't know who that girl on the right is, but I'm sure she was cool.