Georgia Mom tagged me for a Back To School Meme!  She wants eight of my best school memories.

1) My best friend.  S and I were joined at the hip from eighth grade on.   She and I could amuse ourselves just about anywhere.  We used to watch Sesame Street after school and imitate that two-headed monster.  We were such dorks!  But we sure did have fun.

2) Chorale. Our high school concert choir.  I lived for Chorale.  Our choir director was a passionate, emotional man who put his heart and soul into his job.  And we were GOOD.  The best part was the choir tour we took every spring.  That was a blast.  The one I remember most was the year we went to Disney World.

3) Friday night football games. Football was big in my hometown, and every game was a community event.  I loved meeting up with my friends on cool, brisk fall evenings, walking around the stadium, socializing and eating.  I’m still not entirely sure what a touchdown is, but I cheered when everyone else did.  I guess you could say that I’m not particularly interested in sports.  Except when it serves to further my social life, of course.

4) Making fun of our teachers.  For example, our 11th grade English teacher.  She spent the entire year teaching expository writing.  (Incidentally, I attribute any writing skills I possess to this teacher, and it was in this class that I discovered I liked writing and had a knack for it.)  She was older than Mohammed, and she rarely looked up as we worked on our writing assignments.  When we would start getting chatty towards the end of class, she would peer out over the top of her reading glasses and say, “Five minutes is five minutes” in this crackly monotone voice.

S and I used to mimic her to each other in our best crackly smoker voices, and then we would crack up.  It clearly didn’t take much to amuse us.

You want EIGHT memories?  Sheesh, this is tough.  Let’s see . . .  What else?

5) Prom. I didn’t date much (that means at all) until my senior year in high school.  More than anything in the world, I wanted to go to my senior prom.  Finally in March of senior year, a really nice guy took an interest in me, and we started dating.  When he asked me to prom, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.  I went out and bought what I thought was the most gorgeous green iridescent taffeta dress, with the signature eighties bow on the hip and the most unflattering of dress lengths, the “tea length”.  Despite my unfortunate attire, we had a great time, and we continued dating throughout our freshman year of college.  We broke it off the following September.

6) Church youth group.  Every Wednesday night there were youth activities, and I had a group of great girlfriends there, one with whom I still keep in touch.  Every summer we went to camp for a week, and one year we took a mission trip to Colorado where we helped teach Bible school to underprivileged children.  I remember those trips as some of the best times of my life.

7) Singing.  I took vocal lessons for a while in high school.  In addition to Chorale and the youth choir at church, I sang solos in Sunday worship services.  I went on to sing in my college concert choir for three years, but I no longer sing solos.  It’s way too nerve wracking, and I am uncomfortable performing in worship services.  I did sing in a friend’s wedding, though.

8)  I’m almost there. I need a number 8! Let’s skip to the college years. I loved college. I still look back on those days fondly. I remember staying up to all hours of the night in the dorm, chatting with my friends, and making frequent midnight Denny’s runs for french toast and eggs. And I wonder why I put on 20 pounds in college.

I remember long, cold winters with lots of snow (it was Massachusetts, after all).  I did a lot of babysitting in wealthy neighborhoods on the “North Shore”, and I still keep in touch with one of those families. I used to visit my aunt on Thursdays to help her care for her newborn triplets (yes, triplets!)  No matter how hectic it was, she always made a nice home-cooked meal that I enjoyed before heading back to the dorm.

Let’s see, what else? Student teaching. Concert choir. Riding the T into Boston. Meeting Paul on a blind date. Hanging out in his apartment, watching movies, planning our future. Skipping classes to go to the beach and laying out in 65-degree weather in a desperate attempt to get a suntan — that’s about the stupidest thing I ever did in college, believe it or not.  Those were the days.

So what are some of your best school days memories?