Yearbook
By H.G. Miller
Warning: Many Parentheses Ahead
So, I’ve become obsessed with my high school yearbooks.
Don’t ask me why. They’ve sat on the various bookshelves of my apartments since I first moved out of the house. Occasionally opened to show off my wicked-cool gold chain from junior year, or the impossibly large glasses I had as a sophomore, but that’s about it.
Yesterday, for some reason… actually, I had eaten a block of cheese and a bag and a half of dried apricots, and the new Entertainment Weekly was still out in my car, so I needed something to read while I was, um… yeah, for some reason, I had picked up the garishly-bright yellow yearbook from my Senior year, and I actually began
reading
it.
Did you know there were stories in the yearbooks? I always thought there were just pictures of the popular kids looking happy and our various sports teams losing games. Apparently, there’s a whole theme to the thing.
This particular yearbook was a “Where’s Sammy” theme. Sammy is the name of our school mascot, Sammy Salt Hawk. (No, I don’t know what a Salt Hawk is. Nobody ever told me, and I never asked.) I think they were trying to play off of the whole Where’s Waldo craze that had hit the United States around that time, only they didn’t have the bird dressed in a red and white stripped shirt, or hiding in large crowds of people, so I guess I don’t know what they were trying to do.
Anyway, each section started with the word “where” followed by some clever (and by clever, I mean, you know, for a high school yearbook staff to have come up with clever) phrase that related to sports, or school clubs, or academic programs. Basically, all of the stuff that I never did in high school.
The whole thing made me realize how little I participated in high school (and Junior College, and University, and work life, and…).
So, “where” was I? (See that? That’s a call back. Us professional funny people have learned that some of the easiest laughs to get are from these cutesy little babies, right, c.b.?)
I remember wanting to be one of the popular kids in high school. To be honest, I’d still like to be a part of the “in crowd” at work (and how sad is it that these things are still a part of life for adults?). I just never got that enthused about things, I guess.
I mean, I’m looking though pages of pictures from the Spanish club, the French club, the Forensics kids, the High-Q team, the golfers, the spirit squad, the Hispanic students, the Latino students, the foreign exchange students, the militant anarchists, the… well, you get the point. They all have the same numbed expression on their faces: Must join club. Must be good youth. Must add to scholastic resume for college.
None of that ever interested me. It still doesn’t. There’s an advertising club for young professionals in the business in Los Angeles, and I can’t even get myself to spend the time and money necessary for that thing. They have meetings on occasion, and if you go, it’s supposed to help you network and open up better job openings and all of that, but all I ever do is spend my time trying to get some young media chick to give me her phone number.
So, yeah, it’s exactly like high school. Only now, instead of a gold chain and big glasses holding me back, I’ve got to overcome my Gap-heavy wardrobe and the fact that I drive a car that isn’t a BMW if I want to get laid.
Man, I hated high school.