Anyway, here's a bunch of my thoughts from today. I visited my high school again - I think this is like the fourth-ish time since graduation. I really have a bad memory of this but I know that I visited last semester or during winter break or something, and a couple of times freshman year. Most people I know wouldn't dream of stepping foot back in school after graduation so this may seem weird...I have a couple of reasons for going back.
- I love my teachers. They are seriously so awesome. Even though when I visit I only get like five minutes to talk about my major and how much I love Williamsburg and how everything is the same in Chantilly, it is worth it. They taught me so much aside from the subject material that they were paid to teach me. There are five that I like to keep up with, and I got to see all of them today! And I feel like it's a continued 'thank you' to them that I continue wanting them to know about my life, because they did have such an impact on me.
- I have expectations to fill. Somewhere around my junior year I started becoming well known for making baked goods. Not like they would do a yearbook story on me or anything big like that, but to the people who knew me, holidays (including summer break) meant two things: lots of homework to be assigned over break, and lots of baked goods from Marisa. Of course I still make stuff with my friends, but my teachers have these gaping holes in their lives and of course I have to provide sustenance to them.
- I don't have much time. Once college is over there is very little chance I will go back to high school...that would be kind of weird. I'm actually not so sure I'll be going back anytime soon. My sister's graduating in a couple of weeks and at that point my family will be (finally) done with CHS. Four of my favorite teachers are currently teaching my sister, so it kind of makes sense for me to visit now...but this window of opportunity will be closing soon.
So, yes, I had to go back. There are a few things you need to know about my high school (wow, this is not the easy post I thought it would be). First, there are like 2800 kids there (or there were when I was...I think it's supposed to be a little smaller now). That's about all you need to know. The implications of this include weird security measures like the trespassing rules, a lot of anonymity, and a lot of competition for everything. There's a main office which normal people don't use, but administration has stuff there and as a newspaper kid I was in there a lot to talk to the principal or the finance officer or to put stuff in teacher's mailboxes. Instead of this office, all of our scheduling, counselors, absences, etc. were dealt with in our subschools, which divvied us up by last name.
I decided to get a visitor pass this time, because I do know of some alum who have been escorted out of the building for trespassing. I guess administration saw them talking to teachers. I think that this is dumb, and I was kind of scared of going to the main office because the secretary doesn't like me (or anyone), but there was a new lady there and it was fine. Instead of giving me a sticker visitor pass to wear, she gave me a photocopied sticker, the top of which had been cut off. Cool. I felt so legit carrying it around, and I decided to actually carry it with me everywhere just because I thought it was ridiculous that we don't even have stickers and the passes are black and white, poorly copied versions of stickers on which we aren't even required to write our name or the date. Whatever.
I went through the English hallway because I like the smell of it and because even though I was prominently holding my pass, I was (and am) still slightly terrified of security and they roam the main hall.
I first visited my econ teacher because now that I'm a declared econ major I felt like he would want to see me and eat more of my food. In his class we always had Food Fridays for which different people would sign up to bring delicious breakfast foods (I had it 1st period). Of course I would just bring desserts, but that was actually a common breakfast for me in high school (I told my doctor that when, if I ever, I ate breakfast it was like leftovers my mom had sitting out...she asked for an example of said leftovers and I said cookies. She was very concerned). So for one week for econ I made this new recipe that includes oats and chocolate and if you were at Jamie's birthday party this year you know what I'm talking about. It's very very sweet. When my teacher tried them he proclaimed that they were the best food that he had ever tasted and said they were heavenly. I didn't know the name of the recipe when he asked (I had to send it to him lolol)...later, he would request "bits of deliciousness" and I would make them a lot for him after that. So I wanted to make these last night, but then Chelsea wanted to watch the second half of Return of the Jedi, so instead I made cookies (my mom already had dough in the fridge...which reminds me, I have decided to continuously have cookie dough in our fridge next year. It is the best little snack ever and then you can make cookies on a whim!). But I kind of undercooked them because I hate burnt cookies and they were a little bit larger than the ones my mom usually bakes, so the cook time was off. I told him that they were kind of doughy (because of course I had one last night) and he told me that was excellent news, because he prefers cookie dough and only eats cookies because the socially acceptable way to consume cookie dough is to first bake it.
And then we talked about econ and my life plan.
And then my second stop, every time I visit school, is to see the newspaper room. I say this because it isn't really the kids or the teacher or even the publication that I like to visit, though I like all of those components. I really just like to see how the room and the staff is changing. It is so weird, because the seniors who are about to graduate were new to newspaper when I was editor so I still remember them as little, shy, eager, awkward...now they are just awkward. But they gave me a cookie and I chatted with one of my favorites and then I talked to my advisor who is also awkward, but it was good to see him doing well. I didn't really want to bring in baked goods, because like I said the seniors were the last of the people I knew, so I don't know most of their staff, and that would be weird. But I definitely brought in cupcakes and things last year when I knew most of the staff and they all liked it when I visited.
Then I wandered around a bit with my pass - I had to go see my religion teacher (who is now married to the newspaper advisor), since she had seen me in the hall already and told me to talk to her later. I felt very old when I was walking between classes, like a senior but better - you know how senior year you walk around like you own the place, because you know everyone important and you don't need a hall pass and everything you're doing is important? It was like that but cooler. But again, I did feel old...all of the boys looked like they belonged in middle school and I was seriously stumped trying to think why I ever thought seniors looked big. But anyway my religion teacher was with students, so I went and visited my government teacher (who again told me I needed a phd in economics and that the art club abandoned his mural...while he oversaw four different activities in his classroom) and my favorite English teacher (who reminded me that I need to read more this summer). Again I could have baked things for them but at this point I think I can stop bribing them to like me, and also there's no guarantee that I would get a chance to talk to them at all (I had only emailed my econ teacher to make sure that I could catch him at a good time, but to do this I had to promise something delicious).
When I went back to newspaper I saw my sister, who is in broadcast journalism which uses the same main room (though newspaper has its own back room where most of the procrastination and bonding...erm, I mean work occurs). We talked about how hungry we were and how she didn't want to take her statistics test. Now, I skipped school on a couple of occasions but I think they were all pretty legitimate. After morning AP exams I would leave to go to lunch with my mom. Sometimes during newspaper I would leave to visit our printing company. Once I had my mom call in for me so I could sleep in...but this was only because my teacher told us that we should all do this because he didn't want to have to teach after the AP exam. And the other times I skipped I was sick. The only thing I did to get out of boring classes (like the ones after APs when we were given packets to work through as reviews for the final exam, except I would finish the packet in two days and then have like five with nothing to do) was tell my teachers I had newspaper stuff to work on, which I usually did, though sometimes I would use that time to watch music videos. My sister, on the other hand, gets to leave when she is bored (though not every time...she would never go to school in that case). She will just text my mom in the middle of the day and say that she's watching Finding Nemo again and my mom will pity her and call her in sick. But whatever, I'm not bitter about this (because I actually hate skipping class)...eventually we decided that she should skip the rest of the day, so she texted my mom to let the subschool know she would be leaving, and then I got to talk to my religion teacher for like two minutes while she talked to her stat teacher.
And then we went home and watched X-Men.
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