Facebook Sillyness - Danelle's High School Experience

All I can say is that it was a VAST improvement to the whole Jr. High scene. Yes I loved high school. I loved elementary too, but there's something about Jr. High that makes it the armpit of life. (I think my sister called it that, I can't take credit for it.) I just felt so repressed in jr. high, blah! Some of my art friends got pregnant, it was AWEsome. not really. (They were 14, at best.) My mom threatened to send me to private school because of my bad language (I had a potty mouth, I wouldn't cuss, but I'd say everything next to a cuss). But I didn't want to leave my friends, so I guess that threat worked...

1. Did you date someone from your school? Yes, but none of them really seriously. Never really had a boyfriend, or the DTRness, but boy oh boy I went on a lot of fun dates - picture scavenger hunts, video scavenger hunts, went on a treasure hunt, sent other people on treasure hunts, got free pie and then got handcuffed to a chair a few minutes later, had a HUGE pie fight (something about the pie?), wore matching pajamas with a back door, kissing rugby (but I guess we weren't necessarily on dates), crashed another school's Cotillion, then got kicked out, fire pits, scary stories about South Weber and skin walkers, went ice skating in clothes we got at DI, got heckled by some unruly kids, lots of good times.

2. Did you marry someone from your high school? No. I figured it would be at college, but it wasn't until I moseyed out to California. They have a great singles LDS scene. But so did Provo. I guess I was still too immature.

3. Did you car pool to school? Yes. I drove my sister, I drove Rachelle for awhile (and she put up with me listening to some pretty weird stuff, Bare Naked Ladies to Schubert Concertos. Who listens to Schubert in high school? Axe murders? I drove others on occasion. Sorry if I didn't mention you by name. Luckily my brother had gone on his mission and I got his blue-green Chevy truck, the exact truck that you had, Madison, except slightly different color. I occasional also drove the suburban, but Christine really got the full experience of that car. Oh, the bus was also great. I was just reminiscing about bus memories the other day. Our bus stop kids had an obsession with getting the bus to tip over on snow days. It was a really stupid idea and I'm glad it didn't work, but we'd all lean over to one side of the bus when the bus driver rounded this sharp turn on the corner. i think we even all sat on the same side one day and leaned. Didn't work. Yes, we were 14-ish. Not five.

4. What kind of car did you have? A truck. (A duck! jk) Chevy, Teal, extended cab, could fit six people extremely snuggly. During dinner theatre when I'd drive people home, I remember making Lisa Lloyd and Adam Nielson get in the back of the truck bed and I'd go flying just right over the dip on Sunset in the Oak Forest neighborhood and they'd go bouncing up and down. It was great! Risking other people's lives. I'm glad no one died.

5. What kind of car do you have now? A 2001 black Honda CR-V, I found it and bought it used on my birthday 7/7/2004, right when I had decided to drop out of astrophysics grad school. Tyson and my roommates were watching Emperor's New Groove while I was finalizing the deal with my gay neighbors. I guess I needed to cheer myself up. School had really beaten me down, and I felt dumb as a bag of hammers. I had just sold my 1996 Diamond-colored Cadillac, my dream car (thanks parents), because the price of premium gas was killing me (and it only got horribly worse, good premonition). Yes, no more premium gas cars for Danelle. I'm burned out on them. I had to rollerblade to school for a week, it was about 11 miles away. It was fun though. Except I almost got run over by a bunch of business men going to lunch, they weren't paying attention as they werre pulling out of their executive building parking lot (we're talking Newport Beach here). Luckily with my catlike reflexes I pushed myself off the hood of their car. I really wanted to punch the hood of the car and make a dent in their Voltswagon to remind them to drive more carefully in the future, but I controlled my temper. It's funny how much thought can happen in a split second.

6. It's Friday night. Where are you? Meh. Getting someone's house with bagels, or doing unpleasant pranks to someone's car. Possibly doing my own stunts by jumping into a moving vehicle. Maybe barricading someone's house. Maybe playing the piano. Maybe going to a movie with friends or family.

7. What kind of job did you have in high school? I worked at Old Navy one summer. A guy I had known from elementary school and Kids R Music choir worked with me, and he was now flamboyantly gay. We still had a really good time unloading clothes shipments at 5 am on a Saturday, talking really loudly while everyone else was half-asleep and answering in grunts. I guess we were both morning people.
We laughed a lot. There was a girl that unloaded shipments and worked with us too, and she was awesome. I wish I could remember her name.

8. What kind of job do you do now? Meh. Temp work. Getting my master of education at Drexel U. Watch my nephew here and there. Sell used CDs to the local used CD store. It's a life. Hopefully I'll be teaching and doing physics demos in a high school classroom soon.

9. Were you a party animal? Not really. I was not good when I had to function without sleep. I remember vividly and ashamedly that Jennifer Williams kept us up all night talking about weird things when we were having a sleepover the night before graduation, (I remember Ralae telling her to be QUIET!) then we had to get up early and sing in the choir, then there was the senior all-night party where we were essentially locked in the school, and I started crying uncontrollably during the hypnotist show in the auditorium around midnight. I felt soo stupid, but I couldn't stop crying, I was so tired. Okay, seriously, you can't make this stuff up. Luckily I had my trusty red blanket with me and I think I just laid down somewhere in the school and passed out from sleep exhaustion for a few hours. (We had the all-night party to deter drunk driving and student deaths the night of graduation, in case you are unfamiliar with them.) But on the flip side, almost every night in high school I would always read whatever book that was laying around until 3 or 4 am. I'm a party animal when it comes to reading books!

10. Did you get suspended or expelled? I got in big trouble from the tennis coach when I missed practice one day to do street painting and show my school spirit. I was pretty pissed about that. I was also pissed when we had that sub one day in choir and a bell rang and we all left early (I think I am getting memories mixed up here - wait, I asked the sub if I could direct because it was obvious that she didn't know the song and wasn't very good at sight-reading, and she tattled to Mr. Wright, but I think I just got a warning for that.) Anyway, I think we left early and Mr. Wright was there and dismissed us, but then he was mad we left and gave us all 'U's, bad citizenship grades. I don't remember crying, but my mom does. I ranted to her about it and I'm pretty sure he got a pretty persuasive call from my mom. But we still had to go to detention. It really sucked, and I remember the detention guy asking us, "Why are you here?" We looked like good kids, and we let him know how stupid our teacher was about sending us there. Oh well, we did our time.

11. Can you sing the fight song? Yes. Good times. Thanks choir! Oh yes, and Pep Club sophmore year. Too bad our football team sucked that year, but got immensely better the next two years.

12. Who was/were your favorite teacher(s)? Ya know, I had a lot of great teachers. Mr. Harris was an awesome physics teacher, and probably influenced my career choice, Ms. Spencer was fun, I enjoyed her as a creative writing teacher at times, but she had her bad moments too, I guess you gotta take the good with the bad. I also learned a lot from Mr. Wright, although I didn't enjoy him much as a teacher. I had some great seminary teachers, most notibly Mr. Read. Reader? Something like that. I learned so much about the gospel from him. (I enjoyed Ms. Spencer's creative writing with Ryan and Joel. We really had a good time. Remember the Scarlet Ibis? Ibish?)

13. Where did you sit during lunch? At first outside in the commons area with my packed lunch. NERD POWER! Then I started eating in the cafetaria with choir friends. We used to mix nasty concoctions from all sorts of food and then dare people to drink it, and sometimes reward them with prizes if they did. I think Adam told Lisa he would always accompany her for choir pieces if she drank it, and she did. Blech! It was really gross. Oh, we also played Pit, the card game. Some of my happiest high school memories! I got so good at the game I could influence other people to win. I could tell what they were collecting and start passing them that item. And they usually won. It was fun picking the winner. (I got tired of winning, and I tried to give everyone a turn, without actually telling them that. Sorry if I spoiled any surprises.)

14. Favorite music group? Bare Naked Ladies, John Williams The Last Crusade soundtrack, John Williams Sneakers soundtrack, Hook soundtrack, R.E.M., Cranberries, U2.

15. Where was your favorite hang-out spot? At my locker. Katie gave me one of those gargantuan tins of Altoids and I'd pull it out randomly and say, "Altoid, anyone?" like an "air hostess from the 60's." - Flight of the Concords. Also, Katie Wilcoxson's house, hands down! Watching Space Ghost laughing my head off! Ralae's house was also very fun. Many people have very fun houses. The Drake, etc. I also liked having the occasional pool party.

16. What was your school's full name? "Northridge High School, a.k.a. 'That other school in Layton.'" -Ryan Uhrey put it best. :-)

17. When did you graduate? 1998, make it great!

18. What was your school mascot? The Kah-nigget! (knight)

19. If you could go back and do it again, would you? No, I did it perfectly. I'm done. Time for the next adventure. (I can't believe I used to get up at 6 am to practice the piano! Adam's turned me from a morning person into a night owl! Okay, my family did too, bunch of freakin' night owls!)

20. Did you have fun at Prom? I didn't get asked to my prom. Sad llama face. :-( But crashing Roy's Cotillion felt like Prom, I think I was Quintin's date, he had a girl on each arm. Good old polygamy. ;-) Okay, not really! So it was like a prayer being answered. Yes, we had fun. Moreso than I would have had at Prom anyway.

21. Were you involved in any school clubs/sports? Pep Club, Mesa? some kind of science club, we went and saw Gattaca (NOT Mensa), Varsity Tennis, Choir, possibly others.

22. Are you going to your high school reunion? I went to the five year and had a blast. I don't know what happened to the ten year, but I couldn't have made it anyway. Facebook kinda negates the reason to have high school reunions anyway. I read that in an article somewhere.

23. One of your favorite high school experiences: Ah geez, I'm starting to get tapped out on high school experiences. I guess this is a pretty stupid experience, but my tenth grade English teacher (trying to remember her name) had us write a book report on the classic of our choice and I chose Pride and Prejudice. It was really hard to get into, but then the language just clicked and it was really fun finding the ten quotes, responding to them, and I really liked writing the paper. I hadn't liked English since I had had Mr Puzy (sp?) in Jr. High but started to like English and reading and writing again, if only occasionally. I still wouldn't have taken AP English, not for a million dollars. Writing essays was the bane of my existence. Also another reality that drove me to the sciences. Bring on AP Calc, AP Bio, and AP Physics! Good times! However, creative writing is another story. (I also read How To Win Friends and Influence People in that class. Another all-time favorite book, and preparing the assignment and presentation was superfun. People got really creative.) Another favorite was getting a free pizza from Little Caesars at closing with the trouble-making girls, taking a bite out of every piece, and leaving it on Tyrun's porch. Talk about weird. But funny. I'm laughing about it right now. it's like, Hey, a free pizza! Wait a minute, every slice has a bite taken out of it. WTC? (What the crap?) We liked to play weird pranks like that. It was Utah for crying out loud! Also, it was funny to hear coach (Mr. Harris Physics Teacher) say, "Ah geez, what do you think I am, a Seven-Eleven?" if someone forgot their pen or pencil or something.

Mmm, writing this was cathartic or something. It was good to reminisce. Okay, I guess cathartic isn't quite the right word, but I was letting something out, not bad tension and anger, but just another side to me that I had forgotten.