That One Girl with the Notebook

The second semester of my freshman year at high school was extremely memorable, especially English class. Most people would interpret that sentence as being quite positive - a great introduction to a new part of my life, a happy ending to all of the chaos of moving to a new school district in a completely different area of the state. (My dad worked for Pharmacia while I was growing up in Mattawan, near Kalamazoo. Well, technically he worked for Trilogy and then transferred over to Upjohn-something which then became Pharmacia-Upjohn which then became Pharmacia. Pharmacia was then bought by Pfizer, which meant my dad was relocated to Ann Arbor. My mom searched like every school in the area and determined that Saline was the best for me - meaning that it had a good music program and the highest number of AP math and science classes.) However, some people who know what actually went on might wonder if that sentence means that I was traumatized by that year. To those of you to which that applies, don't worry, I wasn't...well, for the most part. There were some moments. But I've recovered now, so it's all good.

As I entered my sophomore year I knew that I wanted to keep those memories - good and bad - fresh in my mind, for entertainment value if nothing else. So at the beginning of the school year I dedicated one purple notebook for the purpose of recording all of the interesting things that had happened then, and possibly recording more interesting things that would happen that year.

I had no idea my retellings of those events would become such a huge hit at the lunch table.

What sort of stories am I talking about? I realize that not everyone who reads this will know what in the world I'm referring to. I'll try to summarize, but for the full stories I would ask someone from Saline :) Here's the general idea of various happenings:

- OMG I'm Surrounded: During the spring break marching band trip to Disney, EVERYONE hooked up. except me. So when we came back and were able to pick new seats in English class, I ended up sitting between two couples and in front of two people that would tease the couples. For details, ask Kate (/Kitty/Kat/Katy/hey you).

- Shrek 2 Adventure: After completing a project, Sarah Cravens and I and Kevin Dahlberg went to see Shrek 2 at the movie theatre, meeting up with Zills and Venners. This was particularly interesting because it was my first outing with friends relatively late at night (like 8-11pm) with no parent chaperones...and I had to explain what we were doing beforehand to my paranoid parents using Sarah's cell which kept cutting out cuz her basement has no reception whatsoever. Memorable quote: "What is a Zill, and what does it want with my daughter?" ~my dad. :) For details, ask in comments.

- The Many Entertaining Projects of Nerd Boys! : Can "Bohemian Rhapsody" be considered poetry? Can "Romeo and Juliet" be re-enacted using plastic lightsabers and the convenient forest in someone's backyard? According to some, the answers to both of those is a definite yes. For details: ask Joey, Kyle, David, possibly Jacob-the-random-guy-who-dies...really pretty much anyone who was in that class, lol.

- UM Symphony Band Concert: So a bunch of us dorks went to see the UM Symphony Band concert the week after the Florida trip cuz, um, we're dorks, and hey, they were providing a bus to it, so why not? and ya know how I said like everyone hooked up during spring break? yeah, um...I was really oblivious to that sort of thing then, and no one told me anything then, sooo I didn't know that. And nobody I knew in middle school had been in any relationships like ever. The only PDAs I ever saw in Mattawan was this one drummer kid who seemed to be making out with a different girl every day after school. So when two people I knew started getting slightly cuddly during the concert I sorta freaked. And that's all you really need to know about that.

It was these stories and more that I spent many boring hours in class and at the lunch table recording in that purple notebook. (That is, I was initially bored and then ceased to be while I was writing.) At first, the people sitting at the lunch table ignored me, because apparently they didn't remember me from the previous year's English class. Eventually they warmed up to me, surprising and embarrassing me by singing "Happy Birthday" after Katey realized it was my birthday after I reluctantly passed her the single sheet of paper on which I was writing the woeful story of that day so far (nothing had happened. no one at school had noticed. I was a bit sad.) But as the year went by, they became huge fans, to the point where they'd instantly grab the pages to read and pass around as I finished them. One of the girls even asked for a copy of the stories for their birthday one year.

However, the writing of the story was dependent on me having boring and dull times in school when I could scribble stories in a notebook without a drop in my grade. The second semester of sophomore year was not so easy, and I was running out of stories, or at least I didn't know how to express them...and so my writings in the purple notebook dropped off. Occasionally someone would ask about it, and I'd say regretfully that I hadn't really written much. At some point they stopped asking, and the papers passed around the table switched from stories to homework, due the next period after lunch.

I kept the purple notebook. It's in my closet or in a drawer somewhere, the pages battered and smudged and falling out. But in junior year I started a different notebook. It was a blue composition notebook. That one I have in the dorm with me right now. That one contains rants against my mother and the world in general, the saddest poem I have ever written... (Oh man. I forgot to mention "Oh my sweet band nerd" in the stories I mentioned. Our English teacher asked us to write a fake love poem, and then he read them outloud without mentioning the author. Mine was called "Oh, My Sweet Band Nerd" (I think) and it was based on this kid that I'd had a crush on back in Mattawan. Um, if you want details ask in comments and I'll try to find it the next time I'm home...and no, that's not the sad poem I'm referring to) ..., random nature thoughts written in Switzerland, various notes documenting my many travels...and the outline of a ridiculously epic (or maybe epicly ridiculous) adventure, and the whole setting of Saline in the future, starring a couple of twins, their little sister, their parents, their crazy uncle, a couple of evil guys, some Mounties, me, my cousin, the people from The-Leaky-Cauldron.org and MuggleNet, the Michigan and possibly also the Michigan State marching bands, Millish, and a ton of people I knew from SHS. ... Yeah.

So...um...next post's topic: Stories that I made up involving people I know...and their kids. What does that include? oh, well...there was this time when our sophomore English teacher told us to imagine what we might think if we were Puritans, which got me thinking of if we had lived in that time...and then there's a couple versions of future Saline...and like three versions of these twin boys (v1 were in a very short story that's almost like a demo reel when I think of it now, v2 were the stars of the epic adventure mentioned previously and are in the first version of future Saline, along with their little sister and cousins, and v3 were in the short-lived second version of future Saline, and their characters are also in the crazy story I'm thinking up right now)...and the newest tale that's been buzzing in my mind for quite some time.