FFA

Memories of Jr. High

I am going to start off by being brave, and I mean very brave. Pictures often speak more clearly than words, so here's to bravery.

7th Grade: (the days of pink, foam rollers. Only this particular time, I tried a whole head of small braids and then rolled those into the curlers. Quite the look - lumpy, wavy, sort of curly. And the bangs, gotta love the feathered bangs!)

This is the year where my love for Cute Boy began.


8th Grade: (The Scottie Dog pin was a must for this photo - I LOVED it. And who doesn't love the Modified Feathered Bang?)

I developed a love for the mall where I spent many, many hours walking the halls hoping to conveniently bump into Cute Boy. And I remember so clearly the after-school dances (held directly after school) where they played classic songs like "With or Without You" from U2 and everyone stood on the sidelines in tight, huddled groups making it very difficult for some daring boy to break the circle and actually ask a girl to dance.


9th Grade: (I call this my "Kelly Martin" photo - who decided that those abnormally large spectacles were the "in" thing? This is where my bravery takes a peak. This photo has been hidden, stashed and confiscated for the last two decades. I still can't believe I'm posting it on the world wide web, however, it takes a confident soul to finally put something like this on display for all to see - or perhaps I'm just full blown crazy. Yeah, that's probably it because my confidence level just dropped a notch or two since posting this. Poor girl.)

Okay, it's right what they say about Jr. High. It is a never-ending road down to Loserville where the cute, popular boy never speaks to the nerdy girl in saucer glasses.

Despite an obvious indifference on his part, I had worked out a method to my madness by calculating where our classes were and just how slow or fast I needed to walk in order to conveniently pass by him on the way to our next class.

On one particular day, the last bell had rung and the student body was coagulating through the giant, main hall as I was timing my steps just perfectly. It was late in the semester so I'd gotten real good at maneuvering myself within a few feet of him for our last walk out of the school building. I was cranking my neck around to see down the hall behind me to make the needed adjustments in my pace and sure enough, there he was, closer than I thought he'd be and this time he was actually looking back at me! - as if he'd known I was going to be there, as if he were waiting for me.

Our eyes met and for the first time, he didn't turn away. I continued to proceed down the hall without averting my gaze and then...BAM! One of the four giant pillars that kept our school from caving in, jumped out in front of me and stopped me dead in my tracks. It was no small structure, maybe thicker than six of me put together. Not real easy to miss and yet I managed to run right into it, knocking off my glasses and bending them so badly they couldn't be worn. I smacked into it hard enough to send my head ringing and as I bent down to pick up my glasses I looked up to see that Cute Boy was gone, but some other gawking boy was staring at me, laughing. I guess seeing some random boy getting a kick out of my pillar wreck was better than looking up and seeing Cute Boy getting a good chuckle on my behalf.

Ahhh, Jr. High. The Good Ol' Days!