What were you like in high school?

[AchtungNight]

And today the governor of the state the most Cuban refugees wind up in is an oppressor. [deep breath] Please move further discussion of this tangent to the appropriate area. Same for the discussion of other uncomfortable political situations. Back on topic. Thank you.

 

[Duleigh]

What were you like in High School?

My high school was 50% "Old Village" blue collar kids, sons and daughters of shopkeepers, mechanics, electricians. The other 50% was "Yuppie Spawn" sons and daughters of lawyers, doctors, etc. There was a social divide a mile wide that had nothing to do with race or ethnicity, it had everything to do with what you were wearing. If you were wearing work boots, your older brother's hand-me-down blue jeans and a flannel shirt you were considered scum, you were part of the In Crowd if you were wearing a polo shirt with the right tiny picture embroidered on the left breast. (usually a polo player on horseback. An alligator would get you humiliation. Why? Because the alligator shirts were bought at Sears or Two Guys, the polo player was only available at "men's stores")

I was a working class kid, we didn't have much money. My dad owned an auto shop that was always on the edge of shutting down, my mom served school lunches at a Catholic school, then delivered the Buffalo Evening News. I was not academic or athletic, I hated team sports, they were for the kids whose folks had money for equipment and could drive them to practices and games so I wasn't part of their world. I was a damn good swimmer however, 200 meter free style and 200 meter back stroke, but the coach wanted me to dive, and I HATED diving. I soon hated that coach who was bowing to pressure from Somebody's Rich Father so I said screw you and left. I was part of the working minority, I went right to work after last class, unless it was Tuesday or Thursday, that was days for Rifle Team practice. Yes, I shot a rifle twice a week in the school basement and I never made the news.

I HATED math, it took me three years to pass algebra, I even took it in summer school. I don't know why, was it the teachers? It had to be, because when I went to community college it was my favorite class. In two years I went from being mathematically illiterate to truly loving advanced trig. I loved history and civics, it was the only classes I remember that had passionate teachers. Unfortunately the 70's was the end of history and civics, those classes are barely given any lip service now.

Everything I loved about school, high school took away from me. At the end I majored in skipping classes.

How has it made you what you are today?

It was a hellish experience that I escaped alive, and considering the fact that I allowed several teachers to live proves I'm a wonderful guy. The swim coach that pulled me from my top event to let some lawyers son lose, I hope he died in agony. He was my gym teacher my senior year and I never went to class the entire semester, I was afraid I would have used a baseball on his onion shaped head. So High School taught me restraint.

I LOVED English class... except for my sophomore year. I had one teacher who I will name because if he's not dead, he should be. Mr. Kunz quit teaching a few years before I took his class, he simply handed out copies of the Readers digest and told us to read a certain article, at the end of class he gave us a test on the article, which was easy and I aced every single time. That's all we did for an entire year, easy A, right? Wrong. He gave me a D as a final grade, when I asked why he accused me of cheating off of Karen. "Karen sat behind me, how could I cheat off of her?" He was staring at her tits, we all knew it, so did Karen. She was hot, and dressed accordingly. She was an old friend of mine going back to 1st grade and everyone knew that Mr. Kunz was drooling over her. Every guy who sat around her got a D from that Mr. Kunz that year. Mr. Kunz prepared me for some of the officers that I would meet in the USAF, true ignorant bastards right down to their testicles.

Yet in my junior year Mr. Amazing taught American Lit. He was great, he knew his subject and he really lit a fire in me to write. Mr. Amazing was a really great looking guy, blond hair, blue eyes, tall, athletic, square jaw, he looked like a young Huey Lewis. On the weekends he would fly out to California and film TV commercials, I remember seeing him in a Ford commercial, and he claimed to have played a dead body on an episode of Quincy MD, he also did shoots for magazine ads. The girls were so hot for him, especially Stephany, she wore a see through blouse to class one day and she did everything she could to get his attention. She even walked up to his desk and asked him a question and she bounced on her heels to make her tits jiggle. He completely ignored her, and she realized that she made a fool of herself and left. When she left Mr. Amazing wiped the sweat off his brow and said "Whew! That was close!" Mr. Amazing lit a fire for writing in me and he taught me that even the guys who look like they got it all together have problems too.

To be honest, high school did NOTHING to make me what I am today. I learned my values from my parents, values that were polished by over 20 years of service in the USAF. I barely graduated high school 198th in a class of 250, but I graduated college Phi Theta Kappa. I learned not to take anyone's crap in high school so I ended up getting two of my teachers fired in college, but that's another story.

 

[MillieDynamite]

That was because we had a dispute with the Cuban government that still continues. "Dispute" is perhaps the wrong word; let's just say incompatible political and economic goals. So it was in "our" interest to let anybody who wanted out of the place come here. It wasn't done to "help" oppressed Cubans. They just happened to be oppressed by a government we didn't like.

As far as I can tell, we have never entered in conflict solely on humanitarian grounds. We have given guns, more often than not, sold them weapons on humanitarian grounds. And when we enter the conflict with boots on the ground, it is primarily out of global balance of power or economic concerns, and the humanitarian means is just what is used to sell it to the American people. Oops, my libertarian side is showing.

 

[Duleigh]

As far as I can tell, we have never entered in conflict solely on humanitarian grounds. We have given guns, more often than not, sold them weapons on humanitarian grounds. And when we enter the conflict with boots on the ground, it is primarily out of global balance of power or economic concerns, and the humanitarian means is just what is used to sell it to the American people. Oops, my libertarian side is showing.

The United States Military is not a tool of the Department of Health and Human Services. Putting boots on the ground for global balance of power and economic concerns is what the US Military is for. Humanitarian means is what the Peace Corps is for and at last check I didn't see them reaching their recruitment goals either.

We (the US Military) are not trained and equipped to feed and clothe a population that has been abused by their own government. The US Military, AKA "Boots On The Ground" are trained to do 2 things only:

1. Kill People
2. Break Things​

That's it. Handing out blankets and feeding a population that has been abused by their own government actually needs to be done by someone else and I don't see anyone stepping up to fill the gap. Keep this fact in mind - since the "green revolution" occurred the only famines that have happened were created by the government involved in that population. Stalin killed millions of Ukranians in the 1930s by stealing their food and giving it to the Russians who by that time were equipped to feed themselves. Two decades later, Mao Tse Tung slaughtered 50 million of his own people by starving them. In the 20th century communism killed over 150 million of their own people. Throughout the 80's and 90's millions in Africa starved because the thug running their local government prevented donated food from reaching the tribe that the thug in charge wanted dead.

The US Military could step in and stop it right now, prevent it from ever happening again using the tools and training we have, turn of the key, barely an inconvenience, but how many people do you think will survive 2,900 thermonuclear warheads? Blaming everything and anything on the military is a huge strawman argument that falls far short of any point that was trying to be made.

As far as fighting a war for primarily humanitarian grounds, my great, great, grandfather and his brother would beg to differ.

 

[Lollygirl26]

I was thr theatre junkie. In all the shows, and good at it. Decided as I graduated I would do something different and went to medical. I possibly could be in NY or Cali my uncle is in movies and TV. Would I have been? Who knows. Still love the stage

 

[XerXesXu]

My high school was 50% "Old Village" blue collar kids, sons and daughters of shopkeepers, mechanics, electricians. The other 50% was "Yuppie Spawn" sons and daughters of lawyers, doctors, etc. There was a social divide a mile wide that had nothing to do with race or ethnicity, it had everything to do with what you were wearing. If you were wearing work boots, your older brother's hand-me-down blue jeans and a flannel shirt you were considered scum, you were part of the In Crowd if you were wearing a polo shirt with the right tiny picture embroidered on the left breast. (usually a polo player on horseback. An alligator would get you humiliation. Why? Because the alligator shirts were bought at Sears or Two Guys, the polo player was only available at "men's stores")

I was a working class kid, we didn't have much money. My dad owned an auto shop that was always on the edge of shutting down, my mom served school lunches at a Catholic school, then delivered the Buffalo Evening News. I was not academic or athletic, I hated team sports, they were for the kids whose folks had money for equipment and could drive them to practices and games so I wasn't part of their world. I was a damn good swimmer however, 200 meter free style and 200 meter back stroke, but the coach wanted me to dive, and I HATED diving. I soon hated that coach who was bowing to pressure from Somebody's Rich Father so I said screw you and left. I was part of the working minority, I went right to work after last class, unless it was Tuesday or Thursday, that was days for Rifle Team practice. Yes, I shot a rifle twice a week in the school basement and I never made the news.

I HATED math, it took me three years to pass algebra, I even took it in summer school. I don't know why, was it the teachers? It had to be, because when I went to community college it was my favorite class. In two years I went from being mathematically illiterate to truly loving advanced trig. I loved history and civics, it was the only classes I remember that had passionate teachers. Unfortunately the 70's was the end of history and civics, those classes are barely given any lip service now.

Everything I loved about school, high school took away from me. At the end I majored in skipping classes.


It was a hellish experience that I escaped alive, and considering the fact that I allowed several teachers to live proves I'm a wonderful guy. The swim coach that pulled me from my top event to let some lawyers son lose, I hope he died in agony. He was my gym teacher my senior year and I never went to class the entire semester, I was afraid I would have used a baseball on his onion shaped head. So High School taught me restraint.

I LOVED English class... except for my sophomore year. I had one teacher who I will name because if he's not dead, he should be. Mr. Kunz quit teaching a few years before I took his class, he simply handed out copies of the Readers digest and told us to read a certain article, at the end of class he gave us a test on the article, which was easy and I aced every single time. That's all we did for an entire year, easy A, right? Wrong. He gave me a D as a final grade, when I asked why he accused me of cheating off of Karen. "Karen sat behind me, how could I cheat off of her?" He was staring at her tits, we all knew it, so did Karen. She was hot, and dressed accordingly. She was an old friend of mine going back to 1st grade and everyone knew that Mr. Kunz was drooling over her. Every guy who sat around her got a D from that Mr. Kunz that year. Mr. Kunz prepared me for some of the officers that I would meet in the USAF, true ignorant bastards right down to their testicles.

Yet in my junior year Mr. Amazing taught American Lit. He was great, he knew his subject and he really lit a fire in me to write. Mr. Amazing was a really great looking guy, blond hair, blue eyes, tall, athletic, square jaw, he looked like a young Huey Lewis. On the weekends he would fly out to California and film TV commercials, I remember seeing him in a Ford commercial, and he claimed to have played a dead body on an episode of Quincy MD, he also did shoots for magazine ads. The girls were so hot for him, especially Stephany, she wore a see through blouse to class one day and she did everything she could to get his attention. She even walked up to his desk and asked him a question and she bounced on her heels to make her tits jiggle. He completely ignored her, and she realized that she made a fool of herself and left. When she left Mr. Amazing wiped the sweat off his brow and said "Whew! That was close!" Mr. Amazing lit a fire for writing in me and he taught me that even the guys who look like they got it all together have problems too.

To be honest, high school did NOTHING to make me what I am today. I learned my values from my parents, values that were polished by over 20 years of service in the USAF. I barely graduated high school 198th in a class of 250, but I graduated college Phi Theta Kappa. I learned not to take anyone's crap in high school so I ended up getting two of my teachers fired in college, but that's another story.

Question on size. When you say you graduated High School in a class of 250, what was the size of your school? My matriculation year was about 25. The whole school, 7 years secondary 12 to 18, was about 500 students. I know school experiences will be different but I'd like to get a measure of how different.

 

[gunhilltrain]

As far as I can tell, we have never entered in conflict solely on humanitarian grounds. We have given guns, more often than not, sold them weapons on humanitarian grounds. And when we enter the conflict with boots on the ground, it is primarily out of global balance of power or economic concerns, and the humanitarian means is just what is used to sell it to the American people. Oops, my libertarian side is showing.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest a geopolitical rule of thumb. No nation has ever entered into any conflict on humanitarian grounds - not once If they say so, it's just a pretext. At least before about 1945, they were more honest about what they were doing. Conquering or defending, yes, maybe both in the same war depending on how their fortunes go.

 

[Lady2020]

Extremely shy introvert.

 

[Duleigh]

Question on size. When you say you graduated High School in a class of 250, what was the size of your school? My matriculation year was about 25. The whole school, 7 years secondary 12 to 18, was about 500 students. I know school experiences will be different but I'd like to get a measure of how different.

I went to a private (Catholic) elementary school which was Kindergarten then grades 1 through 5, there were public elementary schools that cover grades Kindergarten through 5 also. The elementary schools feed their students into middle schools which are larger, grades 6,7,and 8, then the middle schools feed their students into two different high schools. High school covered grades 9 through 12, with about a thousand students total in the school. My entire senior class was 250 people, it was a school that covered several growing villages and townships.

A fellow I know from another high school in the area said there were 1000 kids in his graduating class (No wonder why they always beat us at football, they had a larger talent pool to draw from.)

When my kids graduated from their school in North Dakota it was what we call a K thru 12 school, Kindergarten starts at 5 years old then they go to first grade through 12th grade with about 12 to 20 kids in each grade.

Each school district sets up schooling the way they believe it works best for their students. I went to a suburban school system, my kids went to a rural school system, my friend went to a city school system. I know of a city where they have two levels of high school, grades 9 and 10 in one building, grades 11 and 12 in another building. When I tried to be a teacher I did my student teaching in a school right on the city line, many of the students came out of the city of Buffalo even though this was a school for the town of Cheektowaga. The Buffalo parents were paying tuition for their students to go to that school because they thought it was a better school. I know it sounds like a disorganized mess, but that's only because it is.

 

[gunhilltrain]

And today the governor of the state the most Cuban refugees wind up in is an oppressor. [deep breath] Please move further discussion of this tangent to the appropriate area. Same for the discussion of other uncomfortable political situations. Back on topic. Thank you.

One could argue that what goes on in high schools is a political issue. Cuban refugees, well, that is sort of off-topic.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I fully Agree. However, on your earlier statement, I take umbrage. The Army Core of Enengers are excellent builders, both for war and in peacetime. They built many damns and roads in this country and others

I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest a geopolitical rule of thumb. No nation has ever entered into any conflict on humanitarian grounds - not once If they say so, it's just a pretext. At least before about 1945, they were more honest about what they were doing. Conquering or defending, yes, maybe both in the same war depending on how their fortunes go.

.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I fully Agree. However, on your earlier statement, I take umbrage. The Army Core of Enengers are excellent builders, both for war and in peacetime. They built many damns and roads in this country and others


.

I guess the Army Corps of Engineers would qualify, although I don't know much about its history. It seems to be a military organization that also would up doing civil projects because they have the expertise for it.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Well, they built a damn in the Oklahoma Panhandle that didn't go to bedrock, and the underground stream sucked all the water out of the lake. So not so expert as we were led to believe at times. LOL

I guess the Army Corps of Engineers would qualify, although I don't know much about its history. It seems to be a military organization that also would up doing civil projects because they have the expertise for it.

 

[elizaloo]

Early 80's, small town, two years at Catholic HS (until I staged a revolt) then local Public, smart, athletic, virgin, afraid of anything to do with sex - didn't date and didn't even kiss anyone until I met my future exH Senior year. Worked on the school newspaper and was a stringer for two locals is about all I enjoyed about HS.

Yeah, don't miss it and wouldn't go back for all the tea, as they say. Kept a few good friends and that's all.

 

[30bandits]

Very shy and confused. Like most girls.
went to an all girls Catholic high school .
scared to death to even think of sexual things.. everything was a sin!

you know what billy joel says...

 

[ChloeTzang]

LOL. I was the only remotely Asian girl in my semi-rural High School, but I'd grown up there and had a lot of friends so it wasn't really much of an issue. Extroverted, noisy, had a lot of good comeback lines for any shit that came my way, studied hard and did really well academically at school (Tiger Mom) altho I was only ever top in one subject, but nowhere near being a nerd. I trained at Taekwondo from when I was 5, and I really liked sparring, and I was pretty good at it (still do / am - finally got my black belt a few years ago). Got into one fight at high school in my first year when some older girl tried to bully the little Asian girl, but hey, taekwondo. I got suspended for a week after damaging her, my grandad picked me up from high school, took me out and bought me my first rifle. Yaaay for Chloe. LOL. Worked part-time in my granddad's supermarket doing pretty much every job there over time, and had one boyfriend right thru high school. Started skydiving in my last year at high school.

Read a lot, used to go range shooting with my granddads from when I was little, did those fun things like field parties and prairie dog shooting on farms, driving around with my boyfriend and his friends in old trucks (everyone had old trucks...) and underage drinking.... but aside from that I was a bit of an anomaly in that me and my brothers were the only kids at school that travelled outside of the US, and we were away most summers to wherever my dad was working. Got to go to Riyadh, Kalimantan, Buenos Aires, South Africa (Pretoria) thru my high school years - one summer in each, with side trips to a lot of different countries, so I had a pretty unusual teenage lifestyle.

I had my own bodyguard in Kalimantan who was an Indonesian Army Sgt - that was an experience - it was like having my own tour guide and it got a bit weird sometimes - it was a mining town and a bit dangerous, and I had the lovely experience of going thru Saudi customs and getting all my clothes in my suitcase pawed over - yuck. Aside from that tho, I loved Riyadh despite all the restrictions on what women can do. I got to meet quite a few Saudi girls - daughters of Saudi's my dad worked with - incredibly hospitable and friendly and a lot of them were really well educated too. Opened my eyes a bit, because Saudi gets a bit of a bad rep. In Pretoria almost everyone my dad worked with were Afrikaners, so I got to learn some Afrikaans and stayed on a couple of farms, went on safari camps, camped out in the Kalahari and in Kruger National Park, went diving at Sodwana Bay in Kwazulu Natal, went thru one of the black townships outside Pretoria in one of those big armored Kaspir trucks with a police guy who my dad knew, got familiar with South African home security - razor wire along the top of the wall around the house, grills over all the doors and windows, alarm systems, 24/7 armed response (dad lived in a very secure compound).

LOL and Buenos Aires. What can I say! Wonderful food, great cafes, really friendly Argentines, I even learnt a little Spanish and I bought a Louis IV cup and saucer in an antique market in San Telmo, which was my favorite part of BA. Made a couple of really good Argentine friends (daughters of a guy my dad worked with) and we have kept in touch ever since. Anyhow, I could waffle on and on but I loved my high school years. It was a pretty magical time for me all the way thru and leaving home and heading off to university was a bit sad, but one adapts. I did miss all the travel tho.

 

[madelinemasoch]

Depressed. I was a cutter, in both senses of the term.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Depressed. I was a cutter, in both senses of the term.

Madeline, I do hope you've stopped. My daughter nearly did, at seventeen - a parent never forgets that helplessness. My heart aches - stay safe.

 

[JaxRhapsody]

Outcast, loser, nobody really liked me, was the butt of everybodies jokes, some of the teachers didn't like me, my two cousins ignored me. I tried to fit in for a while, but said fuck it. There were a few people from middle school, so that didn't help. I was kinda depressed. I like to pretend school after about maybe 4th or 5th grade never happened.

 

[madelinemasoch]

Madeline, I do hope you've stopped. My daughter nearly did, at seventeen - a parent never forgets that helplessness. My heart aches - stay safe.

Thank you. I wish you and your daughter the best as well.

 

[BobbyLaker]

Curious about what kind of Breakfast Club atmosphere we got here. I’ve been thinking back to my high school years lately as I explore middle age. It’s interesting. Hope everyone gets what’s going through my head here.

What were you like in High School? How has it made you what you are today?

I was a Basket Case. Serious overly introverted class clown with an overactive imagination, confused sense of humor, overinflated ego. Ever known a dumb kid who slipped love notes in a cheerleader’s locker and hoped for good results? That was me. And yes, I know not to expect good results from such a thing now. Life’s already taught me the lesson. Please don’t bother attempting the job the cheerleader and the principal already have accomplished. Thx in advance.

Please don’t post anything you aren’t comfortable sharing. Thx.

I can honestly say that I was a royal pain in the arse!

Haven't changed all that much

 

[Codoc24]

Introvert, only had a couple of friends. Sadly they have both passed. Grew up in the country, near a very conservative small town in TX. I started listening to heavy metal in high school in the late 70s and grew my hair long and got an ear pierced. Everybody thought I was worshipping Satan. I hated that town. So glad when I graduated and moved away. They were a bunch of narrow minded bigots. (FYI I'm a straight, white, male) Best thing I ever did was move away, go to college, and experience different people and cultures from other parts of the country and the world. The people in that town, and most tiny towns, live in their little bubble with people who look like them, think like them, act like them, worship like them and anybody who is not in their bubble are heathen sinners and outcasts. I'm still a head banging introvert but not near as painfully introverted as I was.

 

[saintcero]

in HS? I was Miserable, suicidal, lonely, hopeless. It took a while but things got better. Going to therapy now to help clean up some leftovers.

 

[_Lynn_]

Outcast, loser, nobody really liked me, was the butt of everybodies jokes, some of the teachers didn't like me, my two cousins ignored me. I tried to fit in for a while, but said fuck it. There were a few people from middle school, so that didn't help. I was kinda depressed. I like to pretend school after about maybe 4th or 5th grade never happened.

Sounds like me. I was bullied from the time I started school until they kicked me out (I was pregnant, and that was a huge sin where I lived).

 

[AchtungNight]

Sounds like me. I was bullied from the time I started school until they kicked me out (I was pregnant, and that was a huge sin where I lived).

Sorry you had to go through that. I have found more wisdom in satire films liked Unpregnant and Saved! regarding such circumstances than I have in other more judgmental media. That’s the main reason I’m pro-choice.