If someone asked me to describe my high school experience in one word, I’m not sure that I’d be able to do it. High school was a lot. Between navigating the nuns, grades, and friends, there was a lot to keep track of during those four years. I met some of the coolest people and had some really great experiences. Looking back, high school as a whole feels like a fever dream, but I can’t say my four years there weren’t interesting.
- No Boys
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This is classic all-girl’s school, but sometimes it felt like it had been years since I’d seen a boy. I think we all had a radar or something, because every time someone even close to our age would enter the building, everyone knew immediately. RIP to the cute college guy who was an aide to the history teacher and just wanted teaching experience.
- Hair Etiquette
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Some people didn’t brush their hair for days at a time. I may or may not have been one of them. But I have a distinct memory of our principal telling us to brush our hair for the a marketing photographer who came through one week.
- The Bug Project
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The dreaded Bug Project. The freshmen biology classes all had to suffer through the same project. We had to collect, pin, and classify 30 different types of insects. This project really had the upperclassmen selling freshmen the cockroach they found in the basement bathroom.
- Uniforms
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Our uniforms were surprisingly versatile. What appeared at first glance to be an itchy wool kilt was actually also a blanket, a pillow, a shawl, a towel, a napkin, a broom, a picnic blanket, a tablecloth, and a scarf.
- Snack Locker
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Sometime senior year, one of my friends who was tired of being hungry before second period sacrificed her locker for the good of everyone. And thus, the Snack Locker was born. You had to agree to supply snacks. Then she would give you the lock combo if she decided she could trust you not to be a freeloader. That locker saved me so many times. One time someone donated jell-o shots (non-alcoholic, I promise).
- Health Class
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I’m not sure what health class was like for people who went to coed schools. But my experience went something like this: “Ladies, don’t check now, but one of your boobs is definitely bigger than the other. They’re sisters, not twins.”
- The Theater Mannequin
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There was a mannequin in the theater. I am 1000% sure it was haunted.
- Dead Printer
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During my sophomore year, one of the printers died. My friend made a memorial for it with tea lights, rocks, and a picture of a printer photoshopped onto a stock photo of a family. The next day I received a professionally printed invitation to a dual service: a funeral for the old printer and a christening for the new one. I went. Someone had baked bread. We paid our respects to the old printer and sang ‘Ave Maria’ over the new one.
- Bathrooms
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We had this entire unspoken culture regarding the functions of certain bathrooms. The main bathrooms were fair game for anything. The single bathroom in the library? People primarily visited those because they wanted complete privacy. Always smelled bad. The bathroom by the office? Risky, you might run into one of the nuns. The bathrooms by the gym? A pretty good bet if you want privacy since no one goes there. But if you walk in and someone is already there, you’d best turn around and give them the privacy they came for.
- The Nuns
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Our nuns had a great range of personality. On one hand, one of our nuns (a Lit teacher) lost her mind at someone who tried to staple a paper in class. But then on the other hand, our principal used to sit in the cafeteria with us. In the beginning of the year, if a freshman was sitting by herself, our principal would notice her table was ‘broken’ and gently introduce her to a table with other people sitting there.
- Hair Magnets
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I saw a lot of examples of true sisterhood, but none more apparent than the complete strangers who would pull hair that was stuck to your fleece off of you during an assembly. Those things were hair magnets. Bless all of you.