Stay Sweet! Friends Forever! Gen X Yearbook Reader’s Theater

Unknown Speaker 0:00

Hey listeners, before we begin, just quickly, I'd love to tell you about three ways you can support the pop culture Preservation Society. As you know, we are an independent podcast. We're not owned or paid by anybody. We do everything by ourselves, and all of our financial support comes from you, the listeners. So if you'd like to help us pay our bills so we can keep on trucking. Here's what you can do. One, pledge your support with a recurring monthly donation on Patreon. There are three levels of support, and each one comes with exclusive bonus content. Just go to patreon.com or look for the link in our show notes. Two, subscribe to our YouTube channel. Did you know we had one even if you don't have any intention of watching anything on YouTube. Do it anyway, because when we get to a certain level of subscribers, we have a shot at getting a little compensation, and every little bit counts three. This one is new. Buy your books using our bookshop.org, Link bookshop.org. Is an online bookseller that benefits small independent bookstores, and when you use our link, we get a little bit of that love. All of these links will be in our show notes and in our email newsletter and in our link tree. But most importantly, thank you for being here. Thank you for listening, and thank you for sharing with your Gen X friends. You are the reason we do this, and we couldn't be more grateful to you, Nanu. Nanu, keep on trucking, and may the Force be with you.

Unknown Speaker 1:24

In high school, my yearbook, it gets grossly inappropriate, like so inappropriate. Lots of references to my boobs from both boys and girls, boys and girls. Lots,

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hello. Well, there's a song that we're singing.

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Come on, get

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happy.

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We'll make you happy.

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Welcome to the pop culture Preservation Society, the podcast for people born in the big wheel generation who were the first generation to substitute the number four for the word for and the letter U for the word you in their yearbook messages, possibly implying that they might die for you, or the number two for the word two and the number four for the word for and Make a fun mathematical friendship equation in their yearbook message, two, good plus two, b9,

Unknown Speaker 2:27

four gone. Oh,

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yes, we believe our Gen X childhoods gave us unforgettable songs, stories, characters, images and great ways to sign yearbooks. And if we don't talk about them, they'll disappear like Marshall will and Holly on a routine expedition. And today, we'll be saving the precious messages inscribed into our school yearbooks that no one ever imagined would be read aloud publicly 40 years later, because that's what we're gonna do. Welcome to Gen X yearbook readers, theater. Sorry, Debbie,

Unknown Speaker 3:03

I'm Carolyn, I'm Kristen, and I'm Michelle, and we are your pop culture preservationists.

Unknown Speaker 3:22

The there may not be anything that signals the end of the school year more than the distribution of yearbooks and the signing frenzy that follows. And this topic was supposed to be part of our schools out for summer episode where we talk about things that signaled the end of the year, like Field Day and returning your library books and movies in the gym. Carolyn was in charge of that outline, and she just put in our outline share yearbook memories, and I went deep, and I've talked about this for a long time, because when I read the messages that people wrote to me, it shines a light on so much more than you think. And so in while we're recording that episode, we start reading the messages aloud. And where do you stop? There are three of us, right? And between us, we probably have 20 plus yearbooks times how many messages? And so we stopped. We were just like, whoa, whoa, whoa, everybody stop. This isn't about Field Day anymore. This is its own episode, and it's gonna be readers theater.

Unknown Speaker 4:25

And so we've all spent some significant time with the yearbooks that documented our academic experience in the Gen X era, and we read every scribbled message from every single person, friends, enemies and complete strangers alike. And we've come away with something bigger than we thought. What was your experience reading through these yearbooks this week? You guys?

Unknown Speaker 4:48

Oh, I don't know. First of all, let me just preface all of this with I'm really sorry to a lot of my friends that was really annoying in seventh grade, but we'll get to that. I.

Unknown Speaker 5:00

Is it was profound in a way, because I would have never probably looked at these yearbooks ever again, to be honest. They were buried in somewhere, and I was hoosker Dude, and sucked back into time like nothing else, in a way that we have done before, because these were like little memories that I would have never thought of again, that somebody wrote about, about, don't ever forget the time we blah, blah, blah, and I'd be like, Oh my gosh, I did that. It was, yeah, it was not like a journal, of course, because we're reading what other people how they perceived us. And profound is probably a really good word. And it gave me some time to really contemplate who I was then, and give me a better picture of who I was, I'll come to this whole podcast a little changed going forward when we talk about especially junior high, because I kind of now know a little bit more about myself. Isn't that trippy? Yes, and I felt a few things. I think the first thing I felt was, I don't know how to say this, but I talk on this podcast a lot about times with my friend Kristen or my friend Lisa, and I kind of have forgotten some of these other people. I'm like,

Unknown Speaker 6:13

oh Theresa, Oh Barbie, oh nanny, oh, you know, because, like, I was really good friends with them too. So I think it just gave me a really good feeling I talk. I think I sometimes focus too much on the complicated parts of my childhood, or the moving all the time or whatever. And I think it just made me realize, like, Michelle, like, things weren't always as like, maybe not bad as you're making them, but like, Yeah, you were just a light hearted seventh grader. And even though some, even though I know in my memories, there was some shit going down, and like my family or whatever, I read these messages, and I just got a really good feeling. And then the other thing I just want to say is, when I was looking at particularly seventh grade, at the just the pictures of the teachers, you guys, I was so whooshed back in the time machine so fast, like, yeah, like, it was like, I was in the freaking DeLorean. And then I got sad, because I thought, oh, all these teachers are probably dead. Oh, gosh,

Unknown Speaker 7:15

not dead. They're like, in a nursing home or something, because they're like, 40 or something. Then they were 40, yeah. I mean, they're like, in their late 70s or 80s or whatever, and but to look at their pictures, I was like, um, I'm sorry, did I I was just on the other side of your desk? Yeah, I feel like I was just standing there yesterday. So that was kind of fun, too. I don't know it's validating. I don't know what the word is, but yeah, it just was. I highly recommend it. People. I highly recommend it. It's not what you expect, right? What you expect is to find something silly and funny, and you will find that. You'll find silly and funny, but you'll find yourself coming face to face with who you were in a way that you didn't remember or embrace at the time, because you're seeing yourself through somebody else's eyes Exactly. It's who you were to other people. And you don't often, you don't often go back and remember yourself that way. You're a memory for someone else, don't you guys wish, though, that you could see what you wrote, and other people's your most I wish. I wish I could see what I wrote. Yeah. Oh, and remember to my dad was a teacher in my junior high, and so that concept that you just talked about, so, sorry, no, no, that's

Unknown Speaker 8:31

he is, like, in a in a facility. So he's in a nursing home right now. We just call it, you know, homestead, because we don't want to call it nursing homes homestead, so Gordy's at Homestead, but Gordy was 1000s of kids band director, and so he would have been in his 40s in the 80s. Is that right? Yeah, he would have been in his 40s. Now he's in his 80s, so you're right. And because he was at my school, he also knew all my teachers and my parents go to a lot of funerals for my teachers. It's, I'll get my mom will be like, oh, did you hear Mrs. Chamberlain died all the time?

Unknown Speaker 9:10

I hate that. It's a weird, it's a weird, trippy time travel experiment. Because we, of course, feel exactly the same. Just like you said, Michelle, I was just on the other side of his desk, right? We feel exactly the same, yes, yeah, but we're not. But there's so much to talk about here, because it is, like you said, it's so much more than a Book of Memories. Like, what about the politics of it? Like, who signed your yearbook and how? Because it wasn't just your good friends, it could also be the cute senior who never said a single word to you, but your friends are pressuring you to go up to him in the lunchroom and ask him to sign your yearbook. Did you how I would have vomit ask? Are you too embarrassed? Did you score a particularly coveted signature, someone who was meaningful, right? There was a whole politics is the only word I can think of to describe it. It wasn't just like.

Unknown Speaker 10:00

Like, hi, sign my yearbook. I mean, if it were only that simple, uh huh, I would say it was kind of like that. For me, I would have vomited and fainted at the same time. So I would have ended up falling in my own vomit, basically. But there was, at least for me, I remember there being kind of a plan, like, there was a place like, sometimes you'd save spaces in your yearbook because you know that you wanted some particular person to sign there, saved for Shannon, and she kept, like, a box. She draw a box exactly, or you kind of knew where you wanted certain things. And then you know the the who you wanted was also important. And like, if your friends were going to help you, like, kind of set up, set the stage that all of a sudden you were there, right? Oh,

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could you

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pick up my yearbook?

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Or I remember even thinking, and maybe I was an overthinker, but thinking about the social strata of everything, like, Am I in the same social strata as that person? Am I worthy enough to ask that person to sign my yearbook? Are we not in the same category? I often didn't know, and I would err on the side of unworthiness, which is sad in seventh and eighth grade, I felt like there was really only two categories, maybe three. By the time I'm a senior, a junior and senior, there's like 18 categories of social strata, truly, there are, there's this group, there's this group, there's this group. Did you have those people that would sign super big, like, over a picture, over a picture, like a picture, they happen to be in it, but they don't like themselves in it, so they would just sign over, or they would scribble their face out, or they would, I have people in every year book that would write super big like, they did this on purpose, like, because they thought they were funny. And I guarantee you, I'm not good friends with any of these people, because I wouldn't be friends with people who did this. You know, you only have so much real estate in your yearbook, and then nobody, and then other people are trying to write, like, in between their signature, like your best friend is trying to squeeze in. Yeah, I got so angry at those people again a few days ago. You guys all right, so let's do this. We're gonna start at the beginning with some of our first year books, and we're gonna move all the way through high school, taking turns sharing some of the most interesting messages. So I'm gonna start with seventh grade. This is my first time. I have never had a yearbook before. I have not yet mastered socializing in general. I mostly read books and do calligraphy and a little latch hook here and there. So there aren't a whole lot of signatures in this yearbook, and most of the signatures are from people I don't even remember and possibly didn't really know, because we probably just had a class together. They probably just sat next to me in a class that I had for one semester in 1981 and like we said before, there's, there's a strict template. It's, I'm so glad I got to know you in fill in the class in earth science. Can't spell out Why are you it's, yeah, so glad I got to know you in earth science. You're so sweet. Stay that way. Maybe just, just stay sweet, and hope you have a great summer. And then you've got the classic FF for Friends forever, and sometimes a C, capital C, yeah, see ya. Oh, yeah. And there were some this. This is so this is what I'm talking about. When it shows who you were at this time. This is so illuminating. So I'm just going to read you a couple of samples from my seventh grade yearbook. Grade yearbook, and you'll see who Kristen was. Kristen, I'm not too good of friends with you, but I hope that next year we can become better friends. Good luck at everything you do. Call me, 42180330,

Unknown Speaker 13:35

lots of phone numbers. Yeah. FF. Hallie, so you know, just saying it like it is. And this one gets even better. Kristen, I don't really know you that good, so I hope to get to know you better next year. FF, Debbie,

Unknown Speaker 13:51

Friends forever, but I don't

Unknown Speaker 13:53

know friends forever. Yeah, there's potential. And just to prove what a book nerd I was, here's one from my Spanish teacher, Senorita K she says, Sonia, which was my that was my son.

Unknown Speaker 14:12

No, that's my Spanish name. That's my skin, my Spanish class name, mucho sweaty at una chica, mora de otra, aficionara de Agatha Christie. And so I had to put that into Google Translate, because my wife is a little rusty. You don't remember any of you know, I don't remember. Sorry, Senator Rita k, if you're still alive, it

Unknown Speaker 14:33

means a lot of luck to a cute girl from another Agatha Christie fan, and which is lovely. It's beautiful, but it just means I walked around with an Agatha Christie all the time. I was about to say, there's no other way she would really know that unless you wrote a whole paper on Agatha Christie. But you know that you walked around, yeah, yeah.

Unknown Speaker 14:56

Everywhere I went, I had Yeah, a little clutch because I wasn't.

Unknown Speaker 15:00

Old enough for a purse, yet, you know, you start with the clutch, and then you have your notebook and your stack of textbooks, and then I would have my Agatha Christie book on top, and that was in seventh grade. I love that you were reading Agatha Christie in seventh grade. I'm such an old woman. Yeah, it tracks, as they say. I'm surprised there wasn't like, you know, The Thorn Birds, or, you know, oh, I read that too, yeah.

Unknown Speaker 15:24

What's so interesting to me is that we've laughed about the three of us, is the similarities in our yearbook signatures. You know, that too good to be forgotten, all of those. But yet, there wasn't internet. There wasn't, I don't remember, a 17 article on, like, how to sign yearbooks. Like, how do we all have these similarities across the Well, that's interesting. The country, we were in wildly different places in seventh grade. Where were you? I was in Anoka, Minnesota, okay, I was in Texas and I was in Washington State, yes. So you think about that Midwest, South and Pacific Northwest, and you know, people are chuckling along right with us in, you know, New Jersey and Massachusetts and all those places. Okay, Carolyn, how about you? What did you have? I'm going to start with sixth grade, because in Texas, k5 was Elementary, and then 678, was junior high. And I want to emphasize that junior high not Middle School. And it was literally that it was a junior high school. Like everything about my junior high was miniature High School, from the football team to the pep squad to cheerleaders to everything. So sixth grade was a big jump. You went from a lunch box to a sack lunch, all of that stuff. And I had a great years to be in middle school. So 7677

Unknown Speaker 16:42

was my first my first. Was my sixth grade for me. And one thing I want to note about all of my yearbook signings, they were all in cursive. Every single signature in here was in cursive.

Unknown Speaker 16:56

Oh, now I'm gonna know yes, the boys, I have mixed but wow, I don't think about that. You're right. I'm looking right now. And not to be sexist, but you think, well, the boys might be the one right in print, or something. No, you know, Jeff said to a girl, a Supergirl to roses are red and violets are blue. There were a lot of Roses are red, violets are blue. Like plays on that, if that makes sense. This one was kind of fun, and this was my best, my best friend who I did the sack race with, and she did remember m, the letter in the nice cursive, like the way we remember girl, oh yeah. Remember E put them together and remember me,

Unknown Speaker 17:37

Carolyn, that's that is exactly like something I used to see in my mom's yearbooks. I loved reading my mom's yearbook. She would always have them on the bookshelf, yes, and I did go through a lot of them when we just cleaned her stuff out in the fall, and I just could there was they were so huge and heavy, but, you know, it was cool. She had, I think I told you guys, this old cheerleading uniform with the giant corduroy skirt and the megaphone and the the letter jacket and all the yearbooks and so we didn't know what to do with these. And my sister got in touch with someone at Grand Prairie High School, and want they wanted them so for like to have in their archive. So we donated them all, but it would be poems like that, like that sounds like a very old school. That's where she got it from going through her parents yearbooks, because I loved doing loved doing that. I can remember doing that. I pull them all out. I remember what my parents looked like in their pictures. My dad was so, so cute. Oh, man, he's and, you know, he has this tuxedo on, and my mom has the drape, which I don't know about you guys, but my kids, their yearbook photos were just like in their regular clothes. I

Unknown Speaker 18:47

wanted the drape black off your shoulder thing. Oh, you had the black Yes, and I did put it around you, right? Yes. For our senior yearbook photo, we had several kind of versions taken, but the one that went in the yearbook was, yeah, I had the drape. I wonder if that's the cutoff, because when did you graduate? 8383

Unknown Speaker 19:06

I graduated in 86 and I just wore clothes.

Unknown Speaker 19:10

Also feel like it might have been regional. I wore nothing. We were naked.

Unknown Speaker 19:16

But I want to say I so specifically remember their pictures, those little rectangle boxes. And my mom had one, and

Unknown Speaker 19:25

this probably was her senior year, and she had these bangs, okay in print, or things in quotation marks, because there were these four things that came down on her foreheads. And they were like little J's. So if you can imagine, and they were like plastered, and I, would with tape. They put tape. She said, You slept with tape, and you wet them down, and then you slept, and then you carefully removed the tape. And I said to her, today I called her, and I said, What were those called? And she said she couldn't remember. Then she said, I think they were called spit curls, yes, yes, yeah, because you'd spit on your hand, kind of wet the.

Unknown Speaker 20:00

Down and everything. And I just sometimes you put them on the side of your face, like, Yeah, that's exactly right. She said, like, your grandmother would have them on like the side, like little side burning, kind of looking things. All of that also proves that these yearbooks, besides the signatures, you can tell so much about the styles of the times, yeah, that's like, they're really little time capsules of what was going on, style wise. And even, you know, in the world, you could kind of get that vibe. It felt like an encyclopedia to me. I would sit down and look at my parents yearbooks in the same way that I would pull the encyclopedia off the shelf, yes, and just pour through them, read just every line. And the hairstyles were fascinating to me. The big dresses were fascinating to me. And I have my grandma's yearbook from the 1920s

Unknown Speaker 20:46

and they're the pictures of the rooting team. R, o, o, t, I, N, G, their pictures of the rooting team are hilarious. First of all, they're men. It's not women, and they're dressed in like knickers and high socks I could just imagine, and they'll probably a long, like sweater with, yes, a big sweater with a letter on it, and then the biggest bullhorn you've ever seen, or the big cone is that called the megaphone. It's a megaphone there. Yeah, that's what my mom,

Unknown Speaker 21:13

yeah, like a three foot long megaphone.

Unknown Speaker 21:17

And they would pose like in a like, they're getting ready to run a race and hold the megaphone in front of their face. Yeah? And that the rooting team, so they're like the original cheerleaders rooting. Yeah? Another thing I can remember, and I'm just having to go on memory here, but I used to think it was so funny that the signatures would say used the word chum a lot. You're such a our swell. What a swell chum. Or I'm so glad we were chums. This would have been late 50 like 57 probably, yeah. And I loved reading those because it did feel like watching Leave It to Beaver. There was a difference in how my parents signed their yearbooks and how we signed our yearbooks, and that, and some of the things that we came up with in the 80s are true today. So the Friends Forever, they still do. FF, Friends forever, that comes from us. And then in the 90s, they did BFF, we still have BFF, best friends forever. There's and even the four and the two, yeah, the you all of that is still with us. And can we say thank you, Prince. Prince may have started something that's going to last like in in yearbooks forever. Okay, so Carolyn, sorry, we digress. We were talking about sixth grade. Okay, gone off on a tangent. Okay, what else in sixth grade did you Yes? Well, basically, the things that I came away with was that I was very sweet, okay, oh, so nice. I was very sweet and nice. I was also tall. A few people mentioned to a tall girl, but nice,

Unknown Speaker 22:48

but like,

Unknown Speaker 22:50

yeah, yes, yes. Or I was neat. I was a neat person. Wait, neat, not as in tidy, but neat. Like, seven is cool, like, yeah, so there's the slain coming through again. That's because that is a 70s term. Like, even by the 80s, we weren't saying neat quite as much we were saying cool. Oh, and I was a super good looking chick. Oh, congratulations. That was kind of fun. A couple of things that stood out to me were the fact that every page, like I'm gonna hold this up to you, it was all songs from the 70s that

Unknown Speaker 23:23

so that was we've only just begun. This was top of the world.

Unknown Speaker 23:29

Oh gosh. What else do we have? The way we were quick and easy. And my favorite was very cute. That's like a little time capsule of its own. Yes, tell me something good. Tell me something good. And on the football page, where it was all the football teams, it was hurting each other.

Unknown Speaker 23:51

The irony

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of it being obviously going kind of funny, but they really have a carpenters theme, like they really love, Yeah, yesterday is, well, no, that's the Beatles, right? Yesterday? No, they do yesterday once more. Okay, yeah, we're gonna count it. We're gonna count so there were the hustle. So if I just need leader of the pack, if I need to go back fifth of Beethoven, which was banned anyway, you should make a playlist of your yearbook I should Color My world is even on here. You know my dreaded by

Unknown Speaker 24:30

the year we win anyway, it's just fun. I won't read them all, except I can tell you that I was nice, I was tall, and I told me I was funny. I was funny too. We go. Oh,

Unknown Speaker 24:49

what was your first one? Michelle, my first 1/7, grade, 1982, and I want to show you, if this doesn't scream seventh, eighth grade yearbook cover, I don't know.

Unknown Speaker 25:00

What does? Oh, my, oh, my, what? Okay, let's try to describe this to everybody now. Obviously, you have to watch us on YouTube to get the full effect. To me, it looks like one of those, like Hallmark love greeting cards. It's too sexy for Hallmark, yeah? Thorn Birds, no. It looks like a Time Life ad for a record that has, yeah, that has all the ballads, all the love songs, and they're almost gonna kiss, and they're in silhouette, and there's a sunset behind them, and there are branches across there. It's not just a branch, it's like a giant tree. But also, then the people are in silhouette, yeah, they'll definitely please watch this. You know what happened? And here's what I'm we're gonna need to put, we're gonna need to put this in the Weekly Reader. Whoever was on the yearbook staff, by the way, were either of you on your book? Now, yes, I was on the yearbook staff, and I was on the yearbook staff, I think it would have been the next year eighth grade, but thank goodness. Lots of rubber cement you were on the yearbook staff. Like hell. No, that kind of cover is never going to be on my yearbook ever again, and I'm predicting somebody forgot to send in a picture for the cover to that yearbook company forever miss the deadline.

Unknown Speaker 26:15

Okay, this is funny to me, because it's dedicated to this math teacher, Mr. Waters. And I remember Mr. Waters, and I remember not liking Mr. Waters at all, like, oh, I hated Mr. Waters. Sorry, Mr. Waters, if you're in a nursing home listening to this, but here's what Mr. Waters thought of me, Michelle, you've been a delightful young lady to have in class. Keep up the dedicated efforts and enthusiasm, and you'll accomplish your goals and be a welcome contribution to any group. Keep smiling and don't forget to say hello to your old seventh grade teachers next year, Mr. Waters. Now also understand that I want to say little Michelle, because that's I usually refer to, like seven, eight year old, young seventh grade Michelle. Even though I hated Mr. Waters, this tracks, this was the persona. This was I was respectful. I was I he probably thought I was. He was my favorite teacher, right?

Unknown Speaker 27:07

And then, yeah, so I'm going to read you just a couple of entries from seventh grade.

Unknown Speaker 27:13

Michelle, hi, you're, I understand everyone every single time I read the word. You're, why? Oh, you are. Picture it as why you are instead of why. Oh, you are. Apostrophe, are you okay? Michelle, hi, you're the sweetest person I've ever known.

Unknown Speaker 27:28

Stay cool and keep your big smile too. Love ya. Why? Yeah? Christy,

Unknown Speaker 27:35

yo, I was the sweetest person she's ever, never known. Wow. Also to this goes back to, did you have upperclassmen sign it? Michelle, well, hello, chump. Exclamation point. You're sure are sweet. You're sure are sweet. Oh, and your smile so big you could fit the whole globe in there. Good luck. Beth quotation marks, 86 so that was, I have no idea. Yeah, and then I just want to, I don't have a lot from seventh grade that I'm sharing because, you know, they're all kind of all the same

Unknown Speaker 28:11

in seventh grade, we're just figuring it out. Yeah, but you guys are gonna like this one. Michelle, it's nice having you for a friend. Hopefully in the years to come, we'll become better friends. Hopefully you'll have a good summer. PS, like you said to me, so this is just makes me cringe, because apparently I wrote this in her yearbook, like you said to me, don't do anything I wouldn't do during the summer. Love always nanny. And she was Nancy, but we called her nanny, and then you guys, this will track from seventh grade all the way till 1987 on probably 98% of my signatures in quotation marks either 87 or 87 rules. Every single one says 87

Unknown Speaker 28:54

I do have to wonder, like, what did the first yearbook? How did they sign the very first year books? Because it wasn't 87 rules, and it wasn't, you know, see, see ya with a capital C, what did the first year book? What were those signatures like? Because I do know when it came out. I do know when the first yearbook was oh and when it was in it was the class of oh six at Yale University, the class of 1806,

Unknown Speaker 29:22

oh was the first one I thought I was thinking 19. No, it's 1806 but here's the funny part. Of course, there's no photography thing in 1806

Unknown Speaker 29:33

and so everybody was represented in the little square, just like we do today. They were represented in the little square with a silhouette drawn of them to represent them.

Unknown Speaker 29:45

Wow.

Unknown Speaker 29:47

Okay, that's a super cool fact. Fact, isn't that cool? And so then yearbooks evolved as photography and printing evolved. Once we got photography, then it became like, now our yearbooks like, are like scrap.

Unknown Speaker 30:00

Books, and that's when we start adding things about, you know, you know what TV shows we were watching and all that kind of stuff. But I just have to wonder, did they sign them? What did they write? They'd be saying, and did everybody get one? Because we're talking 1806, right? Like printing was not, you didn't know, like, zip out something, you know, you had to change type and then get all that stuff. So I'm almost wondering if it was, there was just one library or something. Yeah, I don't need to go visit it in the library. It's possible. That's very possible. Okay, so my next year, the following year, was 1982

Unknown Speaker 30:35

and I went to Fred Moore Junior High in Anoka, Minnesota. And it's Fred Moore, M, O, O, R, E, and officially, apparently it was known as more junior high, but we didn't know that. We always called it Fred Moore, but on the cover of my yearbook, somebody wrote in no more,

Unknown Speaker 30:52

no more junior high. Okay, weren't you pissed, though, that they did that? I would have been pissed. Now I'm talking

Unknown Speaker 30:59

about how the letters are made. It might have been me. It might have been me that tracks too. Yeah, it does. Oh, actually, that was 1983 that's the wrong one anyway. Oh, it doesn't matter. 1982 I'm in eighth grade. The template still exists, but there are more signatures and some actual friends, although they still use the same template. I'm so glad I got to know ya in earth science, but it's getting more personal and a lot more emotional. So here we go, Kristen. There's not enough words to explain what we've been through. Even we've liked the same guy, lots of love Cindy, and that's one of the Stein girls. Gosh, and I don't remember what guy we liked even we've liked the same guy, although it sounds like that was hard. That was enough to make it we just pause for a second because it was very I think you telling us that it's one of the Stein girls is very important. Because when you first started and said, there's no words to describe what we've been through, I was like, oh, but in my head, like, well, that's kind of dramatic. That's kind of once you told us it's a Stein girl. Oh no, she's dead serious. Because long time listeners know, you guys have been through a lot. We went through a lot of girls sleepovers. Now, is there at all a chance that this person was Scott Fenwick?

Unknown Speaker 32:16

I don't know.

Unknown Speaker 32:18

And there were so many Scots too. It could have been any number of Scots. There were a lot, a lot, even in my own collection of crushes, it's not just that. There were a lot of Scots in my school. There were a lot of Scots that I crushed. Scott Schubert and our and my neighborhood, he was older, but he was so cute. Well, we even had two Scott S's. So you couldn't even say Scott s, because there were two of them. This one's good too, Kristen, I'm so glad you're my friend. I could cry. You better come over a lot this summer and keep in touch. FF, Cindy, that was another Cindy. I had two Cindy's, and then Cindy was another one. Yeah, Cindy was big. This one wins the award. This one gets the award for junior high earnestness. Oh, my God, this is so good. Okay, Kristen, when we get older, the first thing we're gonna do is try out for the solid gold dancers. All we need is a pretty face and a great body. No talent needed, but we've got all three. You've been the greatest friend I've ever had. You're easy to talk to, and you understand. And here's where the earnestness really kicks in. Remember this above all else, if you ever have a chance to go professional, you take it. I'll be watching just like cue the chorus line movie, right?

Unknown Speaker 33:31

Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 33:33

Love you always. Christy, she was my shoplifting friend was very Oh, so stressful. It's so stressful. Oh my gosh. Well, Christy, I love that, and I love that she had such a future in mind. You know, yes, make it picked out for me. She had my future. Have a chance to go professional. Like, what movies were we watching? Maybe it was, maybe that's left over from fame. Like, was that the seed that was planted from fame? Oh, yeah, so and in eighth grade, for the first time, there are boys who sign my yearbook. This is big, but the boys in eighth grade are at a complete loss. They have no idea how to interact with a girl, even in writing. And I just love this one. Kristen, Well, you sure like to sit by Tanya. Don't you?

Unknown Speaker 34:21

Sorry? I just had like, an asthma attack.

Unknown Speaker 34:25

Oh, it gets better. It gets better. It was fine, kicking your desk. Well, have

Unknown Speaker 34:31

fun this summer. Bye, Todd. So there and all the boys would go, well, so many well, well. And then all thought out. I mean, that wasn't just like, have a good summer. He really remembered shared memories, sure, like sitting by Tanya, don't you? And so we this sounds a little clunky right here, but we would make out in his basement four years later.

Unknown Speaker 34:56

I love I love nuggets like that, because you.

Unknown Speaker 35:00

That comes some of these people too, and wonder who you were sitting by and he kicked your desk. Do you need any more proof than that, like pulling my pigtails? Yes, exactly. My pigtails, yes. Oh, yay, Todd. Do we know where Todd is today? No, but there is more coming in my high school. Okay. The saga will continue. I can't Oh, I love it. Todd, 2.0 Yeah. Okay, what you have seventh grade next? I do have seventh grade next. And I'm gonna start by saying, oh my gosh, okay, seventh grade. Carolyn, I don't know if I'd have been friends with you. You seem like you might have been a tad annoying, I don't know. And Maggie said I was kind of cringy. Oh. Well, based on all of these people that signed my yearbook, I could have told you that I had a crush on this boy named Robert Crozier. Okay, I just remember that was my seventh grade crush. I didn't really understand quite the depth to which I leaned into this crush, so much so that I would say two thirds of the signatures in my yearbook refer to my crush on Robert Crozier, whether it be stay sweet and good luck with my next door neighbor, RC. Love Kim

Unknown Speaker 36:07

to a super good friend. Good luck with RC, FF, Dory. I love how they're all putting the initials because they don't want to give it away, just in case, maybe art

Unknown Speaker 36:18

Clearly everybody knows. Of course, everyone knows. And I don't think I was ashamed, because there were several signatures that alluded to the fact to the girl who signed my yearbook, Mrs. Crozier,

Unknown Speaker 36:34

you were putting it out there? Yeah, oh my gosh. I am hoping that I said Carolyn rich, and then in parentheses, nope, I don't think so. Carolyn, oh my gosh. Then I have some in my yearbook that are just addressed to Mrs. Crozier.

Unknown Speaker 36:47

Mrs. Crozier, you've been a lot of fun, even though you talk too fast. I'm really gonna miss you.

Unknown Speaker 36:56

Then, of course, there's so many like that, you guys, I'm embarrassed. I mean, I was reading them to Maggie, I cannot tell you, literally, two thirds have something to do with good luck with carci. Carolyn Crozier, you're a very nice fret A friend, which I wish you wouldn't move. Oh yeah. Also, this is when people knew I was going to be moving. Yes, yeah, but Yikes. Here's another to a sweet girl. Good luck next year. And good luck with Robert Crozier, but you're moving. RC, saying

Unknown Speaker 37:22

if you're moving, but you guys, all right, I'm just going to end with this one, because, of course, Robert Crozier had to sign my yearbook. Yes, he did. And I want to tell you what Robert said, because there's no doubt that I stay away from

Unknown Speaker 37:38

this. No, here's what he said

Unknown Speaker 37:41

to a sweet girl who I like a lot, Bobby Crozier. Now, I mean, like

Unknown Speaker 37:49

a lot,

Unknown Speaker 37:51

you can't move, I know. And what does that mean? I like a lot, exactly like, like, like, like, and he signed it Bobby Crozier, because, BC, yeah, he went like, with the nickname and Bobby, or anyone that knows Bobby that's listening, I think he goes by Robert. Now, I didn't stalk him, but I just thought I was about to say he goes by Robert. Now, good one. Carolyn. He's a junior high school teacher,

Unknown Speaker 38:20

science teacher and the school district where my sister teaches. So if anyone knows Robert out there, tell him way to go teaching, way to go Middle School, and I'm way to go. RC, I am so sorry. My God, He loves if you know him, everyone ask him what he meant by that in Carolyn,

Unknown Speaker 38:38

like likes her. If he doesn't even remember me, I would be crushed. Remember I moved to this summer, so I would just stare at that and think, if only we hadn't moved, because

Unknown Speaker 38:51

the moving thing, yes, you would be married. If you hadn't moved, you'd be married. I'd be married to an Earth Science middle school teacher or something, for sure. Anyway, so yes, so let's just say that was the bulk of my seventh grade yearbook site, like the signatures. So this is pretty secret. I did not like, not anybody. Don't tell anybody. I like Robert.

Unknown Speaker 39:14

Also creamy. Love to say the least, and I love friends for sticking with me. Oh,

Unknown Speaker 39:33

Michelle, what is next for you? Do you have eighth grade? I do, and that was 8283 and if you remember what the cover looked like, of the last one, we've upgraded a little bit, but it's still odd. Middle school yearbook.

Unknown Speaker 39:47

Oh, we have a country this one though goes. It's like

Unknown Speaker 39:52

a stock, yeah, that you got to choose, yeah. Okay. Here's a couple of funny. This is my friend Paula, who I.

Unknown Speaker 40:00

I'm still Facebook friends with to this day, and understand people like, you know, I was there from fifth grade through through the end of ninth grade through that summer, and these were people that that's a that's a time fifth grade through the end of ninth grade, where you not only make really good, like a good core group of friends, but you also are figuring out friendship. So even with like my own girls, however, many years later, this is when friendships sometimes break up, come back together, you go through a lot of shit. So Paula says, Michelle, we've been through a lot of misunderstandings, among other things. But I'm glad everything turned out all right. I wonder what happened between me and Paula. I think it had to do with my friend Kristen, if I'm I think there was a weird thing that then Kristen became good friends with Paula, and then I got jealous. I don't even know Kristen, and she You're a great friend, and I'm lucky to have that. I'm lucky to have be sure and call during the summer and we me, you Lisa and sharee can go to Klein line and have a total blast. That was a big swimming hole. What if it's still there? I'm gonna look at, I mean, hole. Best friends always. So that's like, that's like 80 so junction, it was because it was like, in right between, like Vancouver, Washington and Ridgefield, and there were, like, these big picture like, kids don't go swimming there, basically. But it was public, yeah, but it was public. And there was a big public beach, but we used to swim all the way to the other side like duck under the lines, and terrifies me. I could have drowned. And then Paula signs at best friends always at 87 kicks now, keeping with the same theme of troubles with friendships, also understand that my friend Kristen and I, we lived in the same neighborhood. We were best, best, best, best friends in like, fifth grade, sixth grade. But apparently, when it was yearbook Signing Day, things weren't too great between me and Kristen, because here's what two people have said, Michelle, again, with the yours, we're all in eighth grade. Now. Everyone's still saying, Why are you? Are you're a real nice person. Stay that way. I'm sure you will. I hope you and Kristen work out your problems. Hope to see you this summer, if not, see ya next year. 87 rules, love Jason, Michelle, it's been Neato. Any ATO, it's been neato having you in math class. I hope you and Kristen can be friends again. You were so cute together. Good job in cheerleading. I had just made cheerleader for the coming ninth grade year. Good job in cheerleading. Stay sweet and cute

Unknown Speaker 42:24

and oh. Yp means your pal. Why slash P, your pal, Shannon McCombs. And then lastly, Michelle, I'm glad we got to be friends this year and that we're both in the class of 87 exclamation point, see, this was a big deal to us. Have a great summer and a great parenthesis, boring year, next year in Ridgefield Penn, apparently Barry had some negative feelings about it, because he says, have a great, boring year, yeah, next year at Ridgefield pen Barry like the pen Yeah, I bet Barry didn't know that too much. Yeah. Who knows? Maybe Barry did. Gary, so I'm in the same place on the verge in in my next yearbook, it's ninth grade, but I'm in the same place as Michelle because I also have a junior high, but my junior high was ninth grade, and then high school started in 10th grade, so it was a big deal in my ninth grade yearbook. A lot of it was like, good luck in high school. And it does feel like you're graduating and going to something really big in ninth grade, things are shifting for me. I'm coming into my own. I have a personality, and I'm letting people see it. I'm not just reading Agatha Christie all the time. High school is coming. Boys and girls do interact with each other, and it's not quite as awkward. Just listen to this progress from Eric. I can't I wish I could remember which Eric this was. Now. Remember, my dad is a teacher at the school, so, and that was very dicey, like, what if people didn't like your dad? It's super embarrassing. But Eric really knew how to soothe my anxiety about that. He says, Well, there we go with the Well, Well, Kristen, you're shy, but I managed to get to know you anyway. Your dad is a swell guy. He must have been smart. He had a daughter who got plus 20 on all her spelling, Garrett.

Unknown Speaker 44:08

That's the real emotional intelligence right there. And it's so interesting. What people like picked up about you. You being any of us, like who you sat next to, that you got good grades. I mean, I had a few of mine, like that. Always got 100 on a spelling test. Yeah, remembered most interesting things about you that you would have thought like somebody picked up on the fact that you got plus 20. Plus 20. I don't even know what that means either, but I guess it must be impressive. Okay, Carolyn, what do you have next? I do have an eighth grade yearbook from West Memorial junior high. That's where all my previous yearbooks were from. If you recall, though I moved between seventh and eighth grade, and I ended up at Mount Lauro Middle School in New Jersey, maybe we got a yearbook. I don't know. I could just erase that year pretty much out of my life. But my friends were so kind. My friend Jackie Harkey, if you're listening Jackie's.

Unknown Speaker 45:00

So she bought a yearbook for me, and then she took it around and got everyone to sign it. Oh Carolyn, it was so sweet. It was so sweet. So I got to read how much people missed me if they even realized I was gone. I don't think some people even like I think some people thought they were signing Jackie's yearbook too. So I kind of skipped those, but there were just some that,

Unknown Speaker 45:23

you know, we're just so sweet, like, you don't know me, but I know you. My picture is on page 33 so I guess they talked like that person had moved I remember, moved there. And then my friend Jackie, what was so fun is that she was on the yearbook staff this year, so she was able to place photos in places. Because that was the other good thing, you guys, if you weren't on yearbook staff, it was really good to have a friend on yearbook staff, because you can say, oh, please put a picture of, you know, so and me and so and so here, or make sure, whatever So Jack, because that was social. That was social coinage. It was, it was you got status for how many times or in what pictures you were. And so there was sort of, that's part of the social strata, where you belong. I know exactly. And so it was really nice to read this, like I remember you, you probably don't remember me. Love Ed. There were a lot of those kind of things. And then Jackie went through and circled in the index, because if you guys remember, at least in our yearbook, there'd be an index with your name, and you wanted all the all the page numbers next to yours, like, if you only had one page number, that was kind of sad, because you knew that was your one rectangle. I think just in high school, we hadn't. I just looked in no more junior high, and there isn't one. So it was really nice for Jackie, because she was able to circle all these names and put, like, still going strong, next to mark Hickman. I don't know who that yeah, or hate next to Robert Brewer, but this was Jackie, not me. But anyway, it was. These were all really sweet, because it was like, we miss you and all that. And it just made me all the super we have to think about that. That's a year after you move exactly significant in the in the life of a junior high school student. Usually, if you're gone three months, you're gone, right? Nobody remembers it is over, nice, I mean, and probably just let even more into I'm so sad that I moved kind of a thing. And then I'm not sure about this one, because Bobby signed it,

Unknown Speaker 47:16

yeah, Bobby Crozier signed it, oh, to Carolyn. And this might make me sad, I don't know, he said to a nice and sweet girl, so I guess he's assuming I'm still nice and sweet. Yeah, hope to see you next year. Oh, does not know you're gone. Here's the things there was also I was going to visit, like, I was gonna visit in like, the fall of there. And this was so crazy, because I remember this visit. It was my st my freshman year of high school, and we went back down to Texas. My dad had a meeting, and I went to school with my friend Jackie. Like, I just went with her. We had to get a little okay from the principal, and I got to sit in on all the classes with her, and I just tagged along. And I got to see all my friends. So I'm going with the fact that Bobby was hoping that he knew you were hoping to see you next year, like, hope you're gonna come back to visit, because I can't propose. If you're in New Jersey, what am I going to give you this lovely river? How will you ever become Mrs. Crozier? Exactly, exactly. So, so yeah, and it's just sad to see some of these, because i i miss these people. They were really important to me. I just saw this. It's just sad. So it's just a picture of TJ Andrews. I don't remember TJs, but he must have helped in the office. He was the laminator,

Unknown Speaker 48:26

laminate laminator. He's like feeding, feeding something into a machine, right? Oh, that's a good job. Well, it's a really good segue. Carolyn, everything you just said into my ninth grade year. My ninth grade yearbook is somewhere in this house. But I looked in the attic. I looked everywhere, and same thing, I went to Ridgefield High School. That was my last year. I didn't know it was going to be my last year. I didn't find out until August. My mom's like, oh, by the way, we're moving in a week and a half. I had been to cheerleading camp. I had made varsity for the next year. I was so excited. It's one of the two most traumatic things in my life, that move was so I got my yearbook, and

Unknown Speaker 49:07

for some reason we got them late or something that year, because the same exact thing happened my friends. Maybe they didn't sign it until the beginning of, like, sophomore year, because it got mailed to me. And you guys, it is somewhere here. It's like, I know for sure it's not lost. It's just somewhere I can't find. It is a treasure. It is, it is all the signatures of all these people basically telling me how much they loved me. And that was like, so hard, and it just made it was like, such a gut punch to get that like, in the fall of my sophomore year, when I'm understand, I was at a high school of, you know, my entire freshman class had like 92 people in it. The whole high school had maybe 400 and now I'm at Saguaro High School in Scottsdale, Arizona, where my sophomore class has like 900 kids in it. You know, we had like so that was such a gut punch. I.

Unknown Speaker 50:00

Remember crying like you said, Carolyn is just so sweet. So anyway, so, but for right now, I'm the end of my sophomore year at Saguaro High School. You guys, when I got this yearbook, I was so excited, because this was, like the yearbooks, I remember my mom had these are like coffee table books. When you go to Harvey has that has that many people, you get these big books. Now, the cool thing about this sophomore yearbook, so this is ending 1985

Unknown Speaker 50:26

is that I'm telling you right now how hard the beginning of it was, how hard it was to go to that big high school. If you start looking at all the signatures I have, though, and all the people telling me, like, how, how sweet, you know, like I did okay. Let's just say I did okay. Also, to your point about you look in the index. Hell yes, I looked in the index. So in this at the end of my sophomore year, I have two numbers. It's my school picture, and then probably National Honor Society or some club I was in. By the end of my senior year, I'm in 10. I have 10 counting the numbers. Yeah. How many numbers

Unknown Speaker 51:04

do you have someone in my senior yearbook? Someone actually signs it. You're such a poop for having so many pictures or something. So here's a here's a few fun signatures, though, from the end of that first year. And now by the end of the first year, I've made the palm line for the next year. So things got a lot better, but it was really, really hard. So I love the detail in this one, because I would never have remembered this detail. Michelle, I had a good year in biology. Wasn't it fun dissecting, or, shall we say, massacring our pig? Well, I didn't know you too well, but you were a great friend. Maybe I'll see you next year. So apparently we didn't

Unknown Speaker 51:40

right to the pit, or that was great. We did, we did frog. We didn't get a pig. Yeah, we did frog too. But that is a high school milestone, the dissecting of fill in the blank, yes. And somebody puts it in your yearbook, that's what makes it a time capsule. That is hilarious. Totally, yeah. And then Neil, I must have been in biology with Neil as well, Michelle, I hope you like being a pommy next year. Don't get fetal pigs' sexes mixed up this summer, or you'll get no points. So we must have not only massacred, it must have been me. What was the other name, Jason. We must have been a team, and we must have not only massacred, but gotten the sexes mixed up. Kristen, you said earlier, how looking at your parents' yearbooks. You loved it so much because it was like an encyclopedia. That's exactly how I felt going through these high school yearbooks. We had pages that said things like looking back at 1985 we have seniors favorites. Seniors. Favorites were male. Vocalists were Bruce Springsteen, Madonna for female. Favorite group was Van Halen, favorite TV show, family ties, favorite movie, Purple Rain, favorite car, Porsche, favorite hangout, yes, absolutely, was the jack In the box.

Unknown Speaker 53:01

Okay, so now I'm transitioning into high school and and in 10th grade, there's still a template. There's still a form of a template, but you get a lot more personal messages, and they're longer, and like you said earlier, Carolyn, people might reserve a spot on the inside cover, like save for patty with a big box around it. There were more inside jokes, you might get a list of things that you experienced together. Like, remember French class, choir tour, it was so nice sitting next to you and typing right there'd be like a long list of, remember this and fetal pigs? Yes. Remember pigs in high school, my yearbook. It gets grossly inappropriate. Like, so inappropriate. Lots of references to my boobs from both boys and girls, boys and girls. Lots my high school yearbook is a testament to the fact that high schoolers are getting acquainted with sexuality, and even if they're not doing it, you know, because half the people aren't doing it. It's like talking about it is people's first step in declaring themselves sexual beings. It's, it is, it's comical. Um, these are from my junior year, Chris, which is not my name. Oh, no one has like, did you go by Chris? Never. You did, never. So this person, for some reason, thinks that they can call me Chris, well again with the Well, well, what can I say instead of but? And he puts but in quotation marks, because, I guess this is the inside joke part. Why didn't I have you in more of my classes? That way I could tease you more about how nice of an ass you have and other parts. Oh,

Unknown Speaker 54:41

that's from Scott dollar sign. Oh, I don't know who Scott dollar sign is, and Scott dollar sign is bad. Know My Name, yeah, yeah. And we don't like him, yeah, I don't know what. And I sent jail for, like, stock fraud or something, right now. And I'm guessing that I just went along with it. I'm guessing I didn't get mad and I just be like, haha.

Unknown Speaker 55:00

Any funny Of course you did, because we would, we would have never brazen. I still, oh, it gets worse. Carolyn, it gets worse. I'm appalled, but it's a variety of people, you know, variety of closeness to me.

Unknown Speaker 55:14

This one is positively schizophrenic, because he really was one of my good friends. And I swear to God, we never did anything together except we kissed like twice, like, that's it. We did. I swear to God, we didn't do anything. Kristen, you definitely are one of my favorite lovers. You're a real special friend and a great person to be with. We have had our laughs. Remember? CPR, I'm glad I got to know you better. Parentheses in all ways. Next year should be a great year. You big senior. We'll have to get together this summer and drink heavily. You're a real great friend, and I'll never forget you. You mean a lot to me in all ways. Enough of that sweet shit, Kristen, I seriously love your boobs, and I love to play with them.

Unknown Speaker 56:01

I hate this person. I do too, and this was not normal people. I'm thinking you had this is not okay. I'm just I feel icky, just because, here's the thing, I just have to interject this. I know you got to keep going, but had you actually done more with him, then I would be like, okay, still kind of icky, but at least this is so gross to me, because you did nothing, and so I don't like him, if he's that awesome. How many people did he tell that you did? Well, yes, that's the thing. How many people did he say that there was more that happened? I think there was kind of a joke about that. I think there was a joke that we were like a couple, but lovers, apparently younger than me. He was a year younger than Oh, so imagine how clearly must have been like, yeah, I felt her up. And it's possible I was his first kiss. I don't know that for sure, like I've been putting me on, but I could have been his first kiss. So he loves to play with them, and then he says, Have a great summer, and call me if you need to get dot, dot, dot. I'll be there in a flash. Love Dave, your husband. So I think there was an inside joke about us being married. Oh, okay, because I was gonna say, oh, that's stalkery shit, right there. Yeah, I think there was something about us being married. And this was another one of the little the, you know, the guys who didn't, didn't grow for a long, long time. So I think he was, he was aiming high. He was, like, trying to play big. Because I think that's a psychological thing. Like, I don't appear to be a sexual person, but I really am a sexual person. I have a question, yes, I'm sorry. I immediately have gone to we loved reading our parents yearbooks and looking through them. I'm having this feeling of like, did Liam read this stuff? Oh, I've told him not to read it. Oh, don't read this, which made him probably want to read it. Doesn't have to say, Oh, he read it 100 times. Oh, my God. He does not want to. He doesn't want to touch this.

Unknown Speaker 57:50

Can't touch this. Do you have another one? Michelle, yeah. Does Carolyn have one? Well, actually, I'll just say that I am enjoy, gonna enjoy listening to your high school yearbook signatures, because my high school, we didn't get them till the following fall. So we didn't even get them at the end of the year. There wasn't, like a signing day. It's so sad. So yeah, so I don't have any high school signatures in my yearbook or any of my yearbooks. I feel like you were robbed.

Unknown Speaker 58:18

I definitely was robbed in some ways, but I was lucky to have one of my best friends be on the yearbook staff, and she got some good photos that I begged her to put in, oh my gosh, good places, because I did want the world to know that I had a boyfriend. He might not wanted to know that he was like his future generations, to know that I was his girlfriend, but I was going to get some pictures of the two of us in there with some pretty good quote, but there's this one picture of the two of us, and the little caption is, we come as a pair.

Unknown Speaker 58:53

Put that in and I think my friend is the one who wrote that caption. And I don't think she, she and I were so

Unknown Speaker 59:01

everybody else wasn't. And so when that came out, it was just, no, I know, but everybody knew, Oh, my God, yes, it's I never, that never occurred to me. I must not have ever known anybody on the yearbook staff, because it never occurred to me that you could, like, jockey for position or make suggestions. I was just like, I have, let's see if I'm worth anything at the end of the year, we'll find out. I have a couple things to just show you from junior year, because I want to show you, you know, you said reserve a space to sign. This is from my friend Susan, who became just one of my closest friends through through high school at Saguaro. Here's what I want to show you. This is Susan's page, and Oh, she got the whole page. Oh, wow, she got the whole page at the very end. She says, PS, please bring your children to me for their doctor, and I'll watch you on the news. Remember, I wanted to be a newscaster, and apparently she wanted to be a doctor. Be very heart, okay, this is the last one. Michelle, Howdy partner, Well, ever since that ice cream parlor when we.

Unknown Speaker 1:00:00

Flicked ice cream all over the walls. I've gotten along with you in my senior yearbook. She's going to sign it to that we flicked ice cream all over the walls at the drama club meeting. And I was like, mush young Michelle. I was like, that is not in character with you. Do you remember that disappointed in my studio?

Unknown Speaker 1:00:20

Not at all. Okay, now I'm coming into my senior year, and senior year is weird. I don't actually have a lot of signatures in my senior year yearbook, and many of the ones that I do have are not from close friends. They're from people in my classes, for the most part. And I really, and this doesn't track, because I really was at the top of my game socially, although I never felt like I wasn't like a cool person or anything, I did feel like I was welcome in most circles, and I knew a lot of people. I'd been in this school now for three years, but the signatures are missing, and this made me remember that by the end of senior year, I was out. I was gonna say, I bet you've checked out. By then, I was completely and utterly checked out. I didn't care about anything that had to do with high school, and this whole yearbook thing felt juvenile to me, and I was ready to move on. I was so beyond high school. But high school was not done. I got a D in one class that I loved. I yeah, I did. I got and I remember, just because I didn't do the work, I just didn't read the books. I didn't I remember, on what we got a test and I wrote at the top of my paper. I'm sorry I did not read the book, and then I'm guessing you'd already gotten into st Olaf. I just kind of had that see on your slide pretty much. And my teacher totally got it. She was like, you'll be fine. Don't worry about it. She knew I was somewhere else already. And on the last day of school, my friends, were all crying, and they're lingering by the lockers, and they're saying goodbye to people, and I was the only one not crying, and I was dying to go. I'm like, can we leave please? Can we get out? And now I remember, I did not ask people to sign my yearbook. I just gave it to people who asked,

Unknown Speaker 1:01:58

if somebody asked, I'd be like, All right, and then I'd let him sign it, but I didn't. I didn't get I never asked anyone. But even so, even despite all of that, there are some good revelations about how people saw me. Ironically, a lot of people saw me as a brain, even though I got a D in humanities, the class that I actually liked and the same themes throughout are still here, and in a strange twist, it's the boys who write the more personal messages and the girls who are writing some form of you're so sweet, I'm really glad I got to know you. Remember choir, remember Senior Social? We have to get together this summer. Have fun at St all if you're gonna rock. But the boys had more substance, which is really surprising to me. So here's from another Dave, not my husband Dave, but another Dave. And he says, even though you don't try to be I think you are very funny. I love being around you. I look forward to seeing you for the summer. And then, in all caps and quotation marks, party, stay small, sweet and sexual your secret lover. Dave, okay, can that's funny, though. But that one, I that one, that one, doesn't rub me the wrong way. Oh, the same way that last year's one did that one, I'm kind of like, oh, that's kind of like, it's kind of endearing a little bit. Yeah. And I have whole narrative in my mind of why these guys thought they knew you better than maybe they did. I just, yeah. Well, Scott, Scott, dollar sign certainly did. Well, yeah, that, yeah, you, you lived in their minds. I think they thought about you long before when you know long after school, Oh, for sure,

Unknown Speaker 1:03:37

it's like an um, then again, maybe I won't. You're

Unknown Speaker 1:03:42

the Lisa. You're Lisa across the you know that he's staring at

Unknown Speaker 1:03:47

my window. This one is so funny from one of the only out and proud gay men in our school, which was not that's not very safe in 1986 actually, maybe he's just partially out, I don't know for sure, and maybe hinting at proud, but like I said, not super safe. And he says, Kristen, I'm gonna miss you, you little bundle of fun, you

Unknown Speaker 1:04:10

humanities was a lot of fun with you on those meaningless field trips. Good luck in college. You're a brain, so I'm sure you'll be successful at whatever you choose. I suppose you'll come back to our reunion with the perfect husband and children, and I'll be divorced and dirt poor love Todd.

Unknown Speaker 1:04:30

My gosh, oh, that's funny. Just Yeah, but he would think like, that is just very clever. You're a bundle of fun, yeah. And so here's Dave, my husband again, from this is a year later, the one who said he liked to play with my boobs. But now, oh yeah, about the but I remember, I'm recalling more about this game that we played about being married so that that lessons. And I do love I really do love him. I called him baby Dave. I really do love baby Dave. Yeah, so, so, so let's just go on record, because we don't want to if.

Unknown Speaker 1:05:00

People know Dave at the time, you weren't, like, offended by this, like, you would like one and on the joke. Okay, so that was a joke. We need to know that. That's very important. It really hit on the joke. And it was a form of playing sexual without having to be sexual. That's what I'm talking about, even the people who weren't doing it, if you talk about it, that is like, this, I'm going into this territory. You're testing it baby steps, yeah,

Unknown Speaker 1:05:26

yeah. So I'm gonna forgive Dave for that last year. Yeah. And like I said, I think he was trying to play big. And you'll see from this message too that there might have been, like, there are two things at work here that might have contributed to our relationship. Kristen, I really don't know where to begin. You've meant so much to me during school. The first time I ever saw you, I moved your chair and you fell on your ass. I'll never forget that, Kristen, I hope you take care of yourself, and I'm going to miss you next year. It's going to be rough without having you next year. You are my best bud, and I love you. I love you. Kristen, don't forget me. I love you. Dave. Okay, now that now I want to give Dave a hug. Have you forgotten Did you forget him? Like, do you? Are you still in touch? Forgot him? Yeah, we forget what we do. I read so many peoples in these like junior and senior year, and reading them back, I'm like, I loved that person. Like it made me remember we were good friends. Like, right? And I'm not talking about the people that were actually my best friends, people that maybe I only had like, two classes with, but like

Unknown Speaker 1:06:36

each other, and I loved them. And I was like, Oh, I'm so glad we're going to ASU together, yeah? And I don't, I know. I feel like you need to reach out to Dave. I think I need to find baby Dave. Let's find Dave. Baby Dave. Okay, we're gonna find baby Dave, because I really did love baby Dave. He was adorable. And you remember in the last message when he said, Remember CPR, so that was the class that we took where he pulled out my chair and I fell on the ground. That was the first day of class. And it should be that seems like such a dick move, but again, it's pulling on the pigtails. Yeah. And I thought, and I thought it was pretty funny you did and and so when we did CPR, the reason he's saying remember CPR is because I can't believe they did this, but we had to do CPR on each other. Did you realize? Yes, we did. We had to do and so he's like, like, putting his hands on my chest. Yeah, and

Unknown Speaker 1:07:32

no, no, no mouth guard, no mouth guard, although you weren't supposed to put your mouth on the other.

Unknown Speaker 1:07:38

Yeah, yeah, pretend. But he did put his mouth on

Unknown Speaker 1:07:44

your breast. This is just insane. It's bad. So you can see where he that's why he was saying he loved to play with my boobs, and now that literally is coming to me

Unknown Speaker 1:07:58

right now.

Unknown Speaker 1:08:00

Oh, my God. Had awful thoughts about you, Dave, a few minutes ago. You are just you are forgiven. You're very sweet. Baby. Yes. We love Yes, baby. Dave, yeah. And this one pulled up sort of an ugly memory. So this is the guy from eighth grade who said he liked and he enjoyed kicking my chair. Okay. He says, Dear Miranda, in parentheses, Kristen, and I'll explain this in a minute. I don't know why I'm writing in a dead person's yearbook, but I'll give it a try. First, I have to say that I really don't think you act like Miranda, but it's a cute name. I really hate that word, but it fits your looks, truly. Now he underlines truly, being totally serious, underlying serious. You're a really sweet girl, and I regret that I didn't get to know you better. And like I said earlier, we would be making out in his basement now, like a month from now, wow. But he signs it love and friends, which I think is really sweet. So here's the Miranda story, and I've talked about this on this podcast before, so this he is in my contemporary American literature class, and we read a novel called The collector, about a lonely man who collects butterflies, and he falls in love from afar with a woman named Miranda, and he kidnaps her and keeps her in his basement in hopes that she will fall in love with him. That's how he thinks he's gonna make this happen. And it's very dark, and he kills her in the end, I just told you how the book ends. She's dead, so that's why he says, I can't believe I'm writing in a dead person's notebook or yearbook. So the discussion in this class, as the teacher led it, was that Miranda was a tease,

Unknown Speaker 1:09:43

as if it was her own fault that she got kidnapped and killed

Unknown Speaker 1:09:47

because she was a tease. Is this a man or a woman? It's a man. It is the guy we don't like. Yes it is we don't like. Yes it is. And so this was my teacher.

Unknown Speaker 1:10:00

Assessment of this novel, and this is what he is teaching to young men and women. And he asked the class, who in this class is the Miranda? Oh, and then he goaded the students into his voting for me,

Unknown Speaker 1:10:17

and I was the Miranda. It was humiliating, and I didn't understand I and I didn't know, like, why is he targeting me? What did i What did I do? But in his message, you can see Todd is like, you're not the Miranda, ah. And there were people boys. Now I think what it was all boys. It wasn't even girls after that class who were like, you're not the Miranda. You're not That's not you. I'm sorry. I don't have any words for how awful that is on just so many levels. And I'm sorry that you had to, thank you, deal with that because he was beloved. He was a beloved. I remember you sharing that too, and beloved by me too. I loved him, but I also felt like, what's happening right? I mean, there was some small part of you, I'm sure that was just like, yes, this doesn't feel right. I was very confused. And even Todd recognized it, like Something didn't feel right. And Todd and the boys like, E, this isn't right. You are not the Miranda, gosh, I know

Unknown Speaker 1:11:20

way to bring the party down. Kristen, okay, do you have more? Michelle, I do. I'll bring it back. Oh, this is my favorite yearbook. This was my vibes. Let's bring up the vibes a little bit. Remember when I said I was so happy because I was like, I was in 10 pictures, like I was in 10 pages in the senior yearbook. I remember when the yearbook came out and I saw all the numbers next to my name. I was so excited, until I started going looking through them, and I was not happy. So this is me, and the caption says senior Michelle Schmidt enjoys a weekend lunch at McDonald's.

Unknown Speaker 1:11:52

I just looked at my index. I only have, I only have two numbers by my name in my senior year yearbook. Am I a loser? Only two numbers you so you didn't join Mock Trial club, just so you could get extra pictures. I was, I was a one activity person. I remember joining Mock Trial only going to, like, two meetings, but then they would announce anyone in mock trial, it's picture day, come to the library or whatever. And I was like, I'm going to mock trial pictures. I

Unknown Speaker 1:12:21

don't even know what they did. They like, had fake trials somewhere, and there were contests, I remember that, and I think my teacher asked me to join mock trial. And I was like, Are you high? Yeah, time for that. And what is it? And why? Oh, my God, I think the only reason I went was because the guy who drove us just home from school, like he was a year ahead of us.

Unknown Speaker 1:12:42

Just he went to it. So it's like I had to kind of go to get to drive home. How

Unknown Speaker 1:12:47

am I

Unknown Speaker 1:12:49

going to get home if I don't join mock trial?

Unknown Speaker 1:12:56

Okay, I love this. This is one of the people that I am going to reach out to because I remember Carrie after reading this, and I loved Carrie, dear Michelle. You're so neat. You are really ambitious. And I'll throw up. If you get a C in government, you don't deserve a C. We'll protest. After all, there's no such thing as an average student. Have a fabulous summer. Have your yogurt shop. Call my yogurt shop. She worked at another yogurt shop down the road. And then she says, Oh, I forgot you're quitting. What quitting? Don't say that. Michelle never quits. Okay, you're turning in your apron. I'm going to miss your little airplane watch. And I was like, I had the coolest watch. It had a bubble on it, and the second hand was a tiny airplane that went around. And I would have never remembered that I know, and the way you I'm gonna miss your little airplane watch and your laugh, and the way you always said, are you ready for the test? I think my problem was that I was a bluebird, but not a brownie. Our motto wasn't be prepared. But let's eat.

Unknown Speaker 1:13:57

I see you, bluebird I see or something like that. Take care of yourself. You're so strong. You know what you want. That's so admirable. Yeah, I wanted to be freaking merry heart. Look what happened there. Look No, just kidding. Yes.

Unknown Speaker 1:14:12

See you next year in the cafeteria. Love you. Carry XO government third hour. And then she drew a little yogurt cup. So I thought that was really funny. Oh my god, that is so cute. All of this is what comes with reading your yearbook. People. This is why we're saying read your yearbooks, because there are revelations to be made. And boob talk aside, there were I, this is what I learned from reading my my yearbooks in this like in one sitting in one week. Okay, not talking about the boobs, but so many people said so many nice things to me about me that I never took to heart. I never more than a handful of people thanked me for the help that I gave them in a certain class. I don't remember that, but they said, Thank you for the help in French, thank you for the help in history. So many people said I was understanding that word kept.

Unknown Speaker 1:15:00

Popping up. And I don't think that's a generic thing that you say, that you just throw out there when you're trying to be nice. And so I'm like, was I? And if so, I'm really proud of teenage Kristen, yeah, for you, I think from this whole experience, I would say the one thing that I learned is that I was worthy.

Unknown Speaker 1:15:22

I was worthy. Yeah, I did not know it, right?

Unknown Speaker 1:15:27

Yes, which is heartbreaking, yet I don't think it was super uncommon. I think a lot of us, looking back are like, huh, just we doubted that thing. Yes, we doubt it, and believe people really would like us, or that we were really bad, or they really wanted to hang out with us and well. And I think what's interesting too, is that now, and it's not just like right now, like this year, but I certainly think the insecurity of everybody, and that we learn that everybody was insecure, yeah, in junior high and high school, even if, even if other people listening to this knew us in junior high or high school. And maybe I would never believe that someone would think this, but because I was very insecure. But maybe they're now thinking That's bizarre. I never saw Christine that way. Christine was always like, so secure in herself and but we weren't. And I think it's, I don't think anybody really was, even the girls who seemed like they were, yeah, yeah, it's true. I mean, suffice it to say, everybody a dramatic reading of your yearbook might be a lot more than you bargained for. And first of all, it's worthy for the theatrics alone. It's hysterical. We were such unformed human beings, and the things coming out of our mouths are like simultaneously earnest and phony and overly emotional and strangely detached. They're poetic and they're also a grammatical nightmare. These messages as you've heard, you've heard us say, these messages reveal not just who the signers were, but also who we were, because it shows how other people saw us. And over time, you can see how people's perception of you changes and how you changed. It's fascinating and funny and thoroughly entertaining. So we suggested in our last episode about School's out for summer, this is what we said, and I really mean it, invite some people over for a Gen X yearbook readers theater go in a circle and read your favorites aloud, just like we did give all the back stories. Did you get a signature from your longtime crush? Think drinking would make this even more fun

Unknown Speaker 1:17:30

and and to be clear, this is not this is not literature. These messages are stupid, but that's our life in those pages. And I, for 1am, so glad I took the time to go back and revisit it. Thank you for listening today, and we'll See you next time.

Unknown Speaker 1:18:00

I love all inside.

Unknown Speaker 1:18:20

You.

Unknown Speaker 1:18:37

We would also like to give a special shout out to thank these patrons. These are our supporters over on Patreon, and we couldn't do any of this without them. So today we're saying thank you to Karen, Jennifer Stephanie, Liz Greta, Melanie, Kim Tony, Jennifer Leanne and Karen, thank you. Thank you so much, buddy. Thank you so much. And in the meantime, let's raise our glasses for a toast. Courtesy of the cast of Threes Company, two good times, two Happy Days, Two Little House on the Prairie. Cheers, cheers, cheers. Everybody go tornadoes.

Unknown Speaker 1:19:18

Bye, bye.

Unknown Speaker 1:19:22

The information opinions and comments expressed on the pop culture Preservation Society podcast belongs solely to Carolyn the crushologist and hello Newman and are in no way representative of our employers or affiliates. And though we truly believe we are always right, there is always a first time the PCPs is written, produced and recorded in Minneapolis, Minnesota, home of the fictional wjm studios and our beloved Mary Richards, Nanu, Nanu, keep on trucking and May the Force Be With You. You.