Virginia Richardson:  

The years go by and we all become so much wiser, making us realize how naive we really were back in high school. Things we once thought were important, embarrassing, tolerable, fun, somehow evolve as we get older. Now a member of the fo-fo club, I'm glad to have had many of the experiences of life. If I could go back to high school, I'd change quite a few things, starting with a sense of self confidence and independence. I realized later in life what a scared little farm girl I was back then, fresh out of 8 years of catholic school and all the brain washing that came with it. Thrust into a class of almost 300, in a school of over a thousand students, it was a bit overwhelming at the time. Next came how my interactions with others, or sometimes the lack of, often would inhibit my choices. But then again, who knew we had so many choices? Maybe some of you did, but probably not as many as we all assumed. Young we were, full of hormones, trying to figure out where to go next. Judging our own senses of self-worth on whether certain others thought we were fun or important, or worthy of conversation or hanging out together. The truth is, we were all worth it. Some of us may have been more socially adept than others, but it did not mean that others should judge. Or make fun of...I remember a lot of my peers laughing at others, usually for just being different. Why in the world didn't we ALL see that were were ALL different? Hmmmm, a repeating phase of the teenager experience, I suppose? It's too bad, though. Sorry, had to put this out there. I've gradually come to a place in my life that I need to acknowledge what happened before as I move forward in the happy life I've found now. I'm sure there are stories all of us can tell of how scared we were at times, and all the mistakes we made based on how we survived the scenarios in HS. For me, I consider that I took the long road and the school of hard knocks, to finally figure it out. To start, I could have gone to college FREE, i.e., no college loans, as I was the oldest child of 10, my parents had split, and my Mom was raising us alone, and we were considered poor by the financial scales that doled out free lunches, how embarrassing THAT aspect of HS was, at the time. I had the grades, had the desire, but didn't think it was a possibility. Instead: I was invisible to the college counselors. I vaguely think I have a memory of one of them asking me, once, what I thought about college. I think it was a time when I was in the counselor's office getting registered for my next semester of courses at HS, and the conversation was routine for them, uneventful. It was probably at that time that I was dismissed and officially became invisible, forever off the minds and consciences of the adults in the educational community. My family is a long line of proud farmers, and there was no active support for higher education coming from that venue, mostly from a lack of understanding or appreciation for such a huge investment. Combined, I didn't see how in the world I could go to college full time AND be able to buy a decent car and afford insurance and rent to move out, etc. I was able to buy a used 1968 VW automatic stick shift burgundy colored bug as my first car...with the money I saved from working on the farm, babysitting at one dollar per hour and housecleaning for two dollars per hour. Somehow I also found the time to do my homework and keep up my grades to be on the honor roll, in between all these chores and jobs. It was not easy, but we didn't feel that way at the time, we just did what we had to do. It was the life I, and many others knew, and at no time in any of those scenarios did anyone know to promote the experience of going to college FT. It was also the reason that I, and no one in my family, ever got to try out or play on the softball or volley ball teams, go to the football games, and so on. Well, and do you want to know how low my self esteem really was back then? After spending half my middle school years as the fattest girl in school, and 9th and 10th grades not so very different, I lost 50 lbs and trimmed up, looked pretty good. At least that's what I see in pictures now, a pretty girl in high school. Back then, however, I felt like I was so ugly and disgusting, so why in the world would anyone want to be my friend. Or date me, or have anything interesting to say. The teenage being truly is an alien, a hormonal alien! LOL! And while we are re-visiting trama from the HS years, I will just mention what a pain in the patootie it was to have the drinking age change in July 1982! I did not, and still do not, drink or smoke or do drugs. However, since my birthday is in December, I missed the change in drinking age from 18 to 21, as it grandfathered each year starting in 1982. This meant that I had to find other ways to get into clubs in order to go dancing with my friends and boyfriend, all of whom were ...Expand for more