Suggested by carlotta’s remark in a current CS thread, specifically the sentence
I liked Twilight (although, while I can suspend disbelief for vampires, I am not sure I can believe that ANYONE would willingly repeat high school forever, that is truly being damned)
Now, while I wouldn’t want to repeat high school endlessly, I rather enjoyed it. Other people were paying my bills. I was having regular sex. I was not getting bullied as I was in junior high school. Admittedly I had no easy access to alcohol, but given that I have that now and never take advantage of it, it hardly seems to matter. I got along with my teachers and my friends. In short, there was little not to like.
Now high school was not, thank god, the best time of my life. But that’s good–who’d want to peak at the age of 17? But I look back upon it fondly (though college was better).
Anyway, that’s just me. What about the rest of you?
I had a great social life, plenty of drugs, a job and pretty decent grades. Loved high school and I’d definitely do it again (if I could have no memory of my adult life).
I had a very strange, split experience in high school.
Up until the middle of tenth grade I lived in Montreal. My high school experience was miserable. I was the guy who was always picked on and teased, and had been for years.
Then we moved to Los Angeles, where I spent the rest of my high school years. Everything was different there. Somehow I got into the “in” crowd there, and had lots of friends, and overall a pretty decent time. I was absolutely the same person in both places.
Oddly, as far as the actual cities were concerned, I liked Montreal a lot more than L.A.
Socially, it stunk - didn’t date (I was soooooooooo shy) and wasn’t particularly popular.
But I really enjoyed most of my academics, discovered my love of languages and physics, and got to travel to Rome for a choral competition as part of the school acapella choir. I made a few close friends who I’m still in touch with 40 years later. It could have been lots worse.
I was a social outcast, and the only group which accepted me was at the bottom of the totem pole - comprised of the ugly, the weird and the insane. While I’ve gotten over the HS experience, it’s not something I’d care to repeat.
Kind of neither. I enjoyed life while I was living it, but on graduation I walked away and never looked back. I remained friends with one guy who died a few years later, but no one else.
The jocks copied off of me, so I didn’t get picked on. The freaks thought I was one of them. When I bothered going to class I got good grades. The worst part was the lack of nookie. I had plenty of female friends, but no sex.
And since I can say that was the worst part, I guess it was pretty good. Although, I’m looking back after 22 years and remembering only bits and pieces. Maybe it sucked ass and I’ve managed to block most of that out.
This. I swear it’s a miracle I didn’t kill myself, especially with my Mom’s “These are the happiest days of your life,” and constantly complaining about how terrible life gets after you grow up. Thanks bitch - you gave me a lot to look forward to. Luckily I made it through and realize that life is what you make it. If today is not the happiest day of your life, it’s because you made it that way. Enjoy wallowing in it Mom.
Ok, maybe I haven’t gotten over everything juuuuuust yet.
It was good, not that I am looking to repeat it, but it was good. I was smart for my school, but good enough at sports to be on the edges of teams, and also lazy enough (though still getting good grades) to coast by and not fall on the wrong side of the stoner equivalents.
I wasn’t one of the “popular” kids, but I wasn’t unpopular either, and life seemed to flow pretty nicely. The booze helped, of course.
ETA: I guess I left out the potheads. Back then, they weren’t numerous to be a “stoner” group all by themselves.
masterofnone: Preach it. I do think I have gotten over being angry at people, except for one chick. But she was from back Jr. High anyway, and that was a whole different nightmare. Strange factoid: my stepdaughter is friends with a girl who is a distant relative of Hateful Girl. Strange because we don’t live in the same town I did back then.
Hah. I didn’t love high school. Lemme go through your points to start with:
Other people were paying my bills. *
What bills? I was not allowed to have any money, nor hold down a job, nor allowed to buy anything on my own - if I did, I had to hide it or parents would flip. Not to mention these people were also telling me what to do.
I was having regular sex. *
No - but I was constantly being accused of sleeping around. Even though I was a virgin all through high school! My dad used to get in the car and sneakily follow me around town, as I went to the Indian store, or the library, or whatever.
I was not getting bullied as I was in junior high school. *
I was not getting bullied as I was in junior high school either. However, we moved so much thaI have never really “fit” anywhere. I have always felt like the outsider, and did so in high school, too. My school was significantly white and yet I was told not to make white (forget BLACK!) friends or see them outside of school, and woe betide if a boy ever called, even just to get the homework assignment.
Plus…there was always a definite anti-intellectualism in my school, which I think is the saddest thing about America. Why was being smart the weird thing? Who knows?
Admittedly I had no easy access to alcohol, but given that I have that now and never take advantage of it, it hardly seems to matter. *
Same here - never really interested.
I got along with my teachers and my friends. *
I got along really well with my teachers. Friends? Not so much. I had almost no self-esteem, due to various issues with the 'rents which I have mentioned here, and I wasn’t confident.
I guess I never understand why people would WANT to be young again. Being an adult, every day of it, is the best time of my life. I do whatever I want, I live my life to the fullest I want, and I love life.
High School was mostly fun for me. I was active in many school activities. I was on a Chess Team that won the Nationals. I was friends or friendly with most of the class. I dated a little which to the inner core of my geekiest friends (D&D, Chess & Model UN) made me exceptional.
However I was actually a poor student due to laziness. School largely bored me and I hated doing homework. I was one of those just get by kids. This of course left me time to hang out with the geeks, grease monkeys, stoners and elites.
No one bullied me like I often heard horror stories about. I either got along or got even in such a decisive way that I was not bothered by the few idiots I went to school with.
We had a racially mixed school that never really had any problems along those lines except for boom box volume wars between the rockers and the rappers. It never came to more than words.
Most of the teachers liked me accept for one or two I frustrated by being argumentative in class and talking to much. I recall a pair of history teachers as the only ones that did not like me. The one I got transfered out of his useless class.
So overall High School was a good experience with the exception of realizing I was a lazy fool that was heading for community college instead of a real school like most of my peers.
Mostly bad, for a variety of reasons, some self-inflicted and some not.
I had been in the same school district since 2nd grade. When we got to High School (9th grade) my class was the largest the school district had ever seen. So they started to expand the High School, but for most of 9th grade we spent half our day at the Middle School, then were bussed over to the High School for the afternoon. By 10th grade the new building still wasn’t finished so we were on split sessions for awhile, in school for something like 5 hours, and it seemed like we were always on the bus.
So at some point Best Friend #1 told me he was transferring out of the school to attend the one his father taught in which was something like 20 miles away. Then Best Friend #2 announced he hated the school so much he was going to graduate early, so he had to take as many classes as he could so I pretty much never saw him again.
Then halfway through 11th grade my family moved to another district and I had to start over in a new high school, knowing I would be graduating in 18 months and most likely going to college far away.
The real problem (self-inflicted) was I was painfully shy/socially awkward. I really didn’t know how to make new friends or talk to girls, and I was miserable. I was not at all athletic so sports was out, was way too shy for drama or whatever. I played an instrument in the school band but unlike my older sister wasn’t a standout at that so it seemed like drudgery.
I did pretty well academically but in that time and place that wasn’t really a big deal, certainly not with my peers. There was nothing like a science club or any sort of Academic Competion club except for Math (I was good at math but loathed it, it certainly wasn’t something I was going to do more of in my free time). I was far too much of a straight arrow to get involved in drugs or alcohol, which all in all was probably a good thing. And of course you aren’t going to get very far with girls if you are unable to talk to them.
So all in all high school sucked for me. College was much more fun.
But yeah, it wasn’t too bad. I was a smart, lazy bum, so grades came easy. I had a decent job for spending money, and my girlfriend senior year was a hottie way out of my league. Some athletics, friends, beer, cheap dope…it’s all good. I think I like my freshman year of college better, but high school will do.
Good: I had a half dozen or so really great friends that I would party with at every opportunity. Lots of cheap giggly pot and listening to music. Then booze later on. I Shined in the music program. I found a good niche there. I did ok in just about everything else except math and languages. Had a rock and roll band that stayed together through the duration.
Bad: Never found my footing with girls. Very insecure. Had a girl that I loved dearly (one of my party buddies) but we never consummated and she always had to talk about every damn thing. Just torture in that regard. A couple of other ‘friends’ but no romance. Graduated a virgin. Then again, I didn’t get anybody pregnant, so I suppose that’s a plus. College wasn’t much different in that regard, come to think of it . The other social bullshit that I hated at the time I’ve pretty much forgotten about.
