>Today, yesterday, tomorrow…

>A conversation over dinner yesterday took me back to 9th grade. Somehow talking about that led to reminiscing during the carpool home. About liking boys, hating girls, journals and cliques.

His name was Brennan A. (full names withheld to protect me from google). I was 12. He was a Woodwards catalogue model. He was in my grade 6 class. Mlle Hawley. I used to keep his flyer in my bed stand and look at it before I went to bed. He found my pendant in the field when I lost it one lunch hour. He held hands with my best friend Kristin the next year. I was so over him by then.

Grade 7, Ivan B. M Terasse’s class. He waited with me one day after school for my mom to pick me up. He tried to do a flip off the swings and broke his arm. I remember him turning green, it was pretty gross. That didn’t work out.

In grade 8 there was Ray D. I liked him soooo much. I called him one day and asked him what an onomatopoeia is and then ask if he wanted to do something sometime. He said he was busy. I asked him for sometime. Nobody is busy sometime. 5 years later we went to prom together. Good times.

Friday night live. Stairway to Heaven and One. Always having safety pins to make calls home. Catholic school all boy school parties. I’m glad we met Dennis that day.

I used to be late for school alot. Alot. After 5 lates you have to do garbage duty. I hated garbage duty. I had to wear rubber gloves. In grade 9 they opened a McDonald’s a block from school, going off school grounds to eat felt good. As soon as we could drive we’d go to Lougheed Mall for lunch. Good conversations, good friends, crappy food. We were way too young to talk like we did, we had no idea how silly we must have sounded.

In grade 11 we used to meet in that same McD’s parking lot after the police came and shut down our parties. Then all go to Hickey Courts out of the view of the road and the prying eyes of authority. Too many fights, too many fast cars. I think our third spot was Mundy Park. I can’t remember but there was always a plan, everyone didn’t have cell phones then.

Mary was my best friend. Then Stacy took her away. Then there was Jill. We grew apart. Kristen stuck around for years. When we were 12 she picked my name out of a hat to make a secret lunch for and we were inseperable for years. When I was at the height of my awkward phase she told me she thought I was pretty, I’ll never forget that. I wonder where she is now. I ran into her sister on Davie street last time I was home and heard she lives in Kits.

90210 parties and Girl Talk. I had to call Aly and sing him Row, row, row your boat. It was so embarassing. During the summer I took extra credit to make my course load lighter for grade 12. I have no idea why I did it school was not really my thing at 16. That decision changed my life.

Class trips to chateaux in the Loire valley, to Calgary and Seattle. Getting ‘grounded’ in the Sea-Tac Marriott for having a Canucks victory party. It was 94, a good year. Sneaking out. We’d sleep in tents, sleep in the camper, sleep under the stars. I wouldn’t sneak out that late now. With age comes common sense.

Paris for spring break, the rapping guys we met in Nice. They didn’t speak english but knew every Tupac song by heart. It was precious. The sweet parisian guys who tried to help our 17 year old asses find a hot club. They complimented my french…I laughed because I knew it sucked. Trying to sneak rose in fear of getting sent home. Our last night in France, we got pizza and ice cream and sat on the beach…even made curfew. Things changed once we got back.

Wine Pine Beach the last day of school. Sneaking into Barnet Marine Park after finals for the annual bonfire. RV’s on Burnaby Mountain for grad. Somehow I lost touch after that. Went one way and them another. I tried after first year, but it was all the same, same faces, same parties, same everything but me. I was different.