School's Out 4Ever Blogfest...

Well, here's my post for Sommer Leigh's Blogfest
Hmmm…May, 1992…

I know I'm not supposed be too serious, but I can't help it...this is where my trip down memory lane takes me! 
Well, I am coming up on my 20th year class reunion, but I have no desire to attend any of the festivities. Let high school stay with the hazy high school file in my brain and let me instead spend time with people that now really matter to me like my husband and kids. It just doesn’t seem fun to hang out with people I once knew or that I never really knew.

I can’t say high school has the fondest memories for me, but I will say it was better than junior high! I can totally empathize with all middle schoolers today. It’s that time of your life when everything makes you nervous and scared. Should I wear my bangs raised up and rolled under with a bunch of Aquanet hairspray? Will it cover up my big forehead? That was me back in 1987.

Ok, I guess my real question was Will it cover up the big mole on my forehead? Truth hurts. And truth is several kids made fun of me since like first grade. Actually, a few years ago, my husband worked at my old high school…Mercedes High School…and I can’t remember the situation much, but I believe a former classmate of mine asked my husband to support him in something…it might have been something as small as buying raffle tickets or who knows…but he was one of the ones that ridiculed me all through school. Does he think my husband and I consider him a “friend”? Not in my book. Yeah right. I’m sorry but jerks grow up to be jerks, and I bet 100% that he is still a jerk. Mean kids don’t ever really change unless they have a genuine personality or heart change. I’m sorry but I will not let bygones be bygones, and I will not be friends with people who made my life miserable.

I just saw a picture recently of me in junior high or maybe my freshman year, but I feel like I look lost in this picture…like I was just trying to get through the lunch line, just trying to look pretty with too much make-up, like I’m just a little girl who doesn’t have much confidence.

And then I think what if this girl (me) in the picture were my daughter? What do I want for her? Do I even know her?

Well, let me tell you that I want the world for her! I want to help her find her way and not be so concerned with what everybody thinks. To not be so stupid as to think that having friends and boyfriends will make her feel complete and make up for how little she thinks of herself.

So, I am doing all I can to make this right for the girl I do have at home…my daughter Celeste.

I’ve lost track of most of my good friends from high school since we all went on different paths. I have to admit, I thought we were all very much alike and that we’d be BFF’s forever. The defining moment for me was when I was already in college and I was walking out of the Behavorial Sciences building at UTPA-Pan American and two of my close friends were waiting for me outside smoking. I thought, is this who I want to be? Do I want to identify with smokers and have my hair smell like smoke? You might think this is no big deal, but it was for me because I saw my life going astronomically opposite of smoking.

But I have found new friends on Facebook…new friends I wish I had been better friends with in high school…new friends that were actually like my best friends before high school but that I got away from when I found new friends.

Does any of this make sense?

It’s like who was I in high school? Probably not a very likeable person, a little snobbish, not too friendly. I think I was overcompensating for my lack of self-confidence.

Case in point, I can say that one of my very best friends throughout middle school and the early part of high school was Mary Alice Villarreal. She was great, funny, pretty, smart…Why wasn’t I a better friend to her? I just became friends with her on Facebook and sent her a message saying we could be BFF’s after I checked out her profile information and saw how she is a fan of Lord of the Rings and Twilight. Well, of course she would be a fan of all this because we had a lot in common in the first place! So, if there is anybody I really want to see at a reunion it would be people like her…there’s maybe like 10 or 15 more…like Melissa, Erica, and several others.

And on another topic…

And what about those spiral journal questionnaires some girls made…the kind where you sign in and spill your innermost thoughts on everything? Those were always fun!
And one more…

What about all those awesome 80’s movies? My favorites...Can't Buy Me Love, Pretty in Pink



You know I love the 80’s but when I think back to the best times of my life, the 80’s and the very early 90’s high school days are not a part of it. What I remember fondly is the my college days…the early and mid 90’s of Hootie and the Blowfish, Four Non-Blondes, Gin Blossoms, skipping a few college classes with my boyfriend (now husband), getting married, living in a small apartment, etc. Those were the best days of my youth! The rest before…just a bunch of generic crackers and processed cheese. The rest right now and in the future? Ok, roll out the mini-Ritz crackers, Disney vacations…all the best with my husband and 3 kids!