Class of 1990 week 7

We had worksheets to do in Physics. They took a long time for me to do and on Tuesday I stayed up past midnight getting the questions done. We graded them in class and I got an A. In English we finished our journalism unit and started English literature. In shop I painted my tool box red as Sarah told me to. With the tool box project wrapping up we were now going to do individual projects so I brought the collapsible bookcase of Rebecca’s so Mr. Lloyd could measure it so I could copy it. He had some left over wood from another student’s project in Drayton that I could use for it. (Our school shared our shop teacher with the high school in Drayton, ND. Mr. Lloyd was in Drayton in the mornings and St. Thomas in the afternoons.)

Part of English for the seniors at STHS was producing both the school newspaper and the yearbook. Editors were chosen from the senior class. It was assumed that I would be a yearbook editor, but one of my guiding principles in high school was to avoid extra curricular activities that my elder sisters excelled at and Rebecca had been an editor and had even worked on yearbook throughout her college career and even became an advisor for the yearbook at the Hong Kong International School where she taught. Thus I had no interest in being an editor. The selected editors were Margo, Jaci & Terry. The editors were expected to show up for the weekly yearbook meetings with Mrs. Kappel. Other seniors could come and earn extra credit for English. Thursday that week I, for reasons I didn’t quite understand myself, showed up for the yearbook meeting. It ended up being just me, Mrs. Kappel, and Jaci. On Friday of that week the class went to Kevin’s house to retake a picture. The last time we took it the film was black and white and we wanted a color picture of us all blowing bubbles, as the yearbook had a bubble gum theme, “Sticking Together” and we needed color pictures for the theme page.

Most nights I watched the ABC lineup or PPT (Prairie Public Television—PBS in the rest of world) those two channels and Fox--which had limited programming in those days were the only channels that came in reliably clear. I got a letter from Rebecca—since she did not get comic strips in Hong Kong I would clip ones I thought she would enjoy and mail them to her. Usually Calvin & Hobbes, Bloom County, & Far Side. Her letter back put me in a good mood. I still didn’t have a completed rough draft for my Institute of Children’s Literature assignment. I was also only getting between 5 & 7 hours of sleep a night. I tended to stay up late in my room reading and would leave a rolled up blanket to block the light from coming out of the gap under my door so Dad couldn’t tell that I was up.

Sunday night Mom, Dad, and I watched the ABC family drama “Life Goes On.” It was the one with the character with Down syndrome. That particular episode ended with the family having a food fight and laughing. Mom said that they would never let such a thing occur in our house, to which Dad added, “Especially if there were any books around.”