1988 Revisited

I knew it! I knew she had it!

Ok, I wasnt absolutely sure, but 20 years ago I have this vague memory of leaving my senior yearbook with Matt Schweder with a request to pass it on to Jeannie Gaines to sign. You have to understand: the whole yearbook business was one of my favorite parts of year-end school (that, and the fact that it was the end of the school year!) I was determined to get as many signatures as possible. Everybody and anybody could sign it . . . 'come one, come all. Do you know me? No. But here, be the first to 'sign my crack' and write "LYLAS" at the end. Because even though you wont remember me 30 days from now, it's important that you pen the anacronym for 'love ya like a sister.' No, you dont have to mean it. Here's a pen . . . ."

So real life got busy . . I forgot about the yearbook . . . . Jeannie forgot about it . .. it fell off the map somewhere between cap&gown euphoria and 'ugh - high school.' Five years after graduation, it entered my consciousness again, and on a whim of nostalgia I tried to track it down. But the book I coveted with such great esteem in 1988 remained elusive, disappearing into the cosmos of bad hair and silly fashion. Comforting myself with 'high school was in general a horrible experience - who wants those memories?' was a help. And the other three yearbooks had been packed away untouched in a dark basement corner for years. Obviously, the senior annual was not a needed item.

But for fifteen more years after the initial search , there were a couple of nagging thoughts: 1. I never got to read what Matt wrote, and that bugged me. He was a great chum back in the day, and 2. The set of yearbooks was not complete. There was a lonely SCHS yearbook out there somewhere, separated from his brothers, looking for a good home. Oh the travesty.

It is 2008. Jeannie Gaines, now Stivers, contacted me on Facebook to announce her parents found my senior yearbook. Aha! Truth prevails!!!!! I was all kinds of wierd in high school, but crazy wasnt one of them, and now it has been proven!!! She was very sweet to sent to me last week. I'm not sure what I was more excited about: reading what Matt wrote, completing the yearbook collection, or being vindicated after two decades. Yes, I'm aware all of those reasons probably require some kind of therapy, but that is another blog.

There will probably be more on this subject. It doesnt feel ousted just yet.