LORD, I was a lousy student! I was the poster girl for the classic underachiever in high school. I was bright and capable of so much more than I actually produced. I was probably the only student in the high school who was GATE identified, and took AP classes in English and History, but finished high school with a whopping 2.5 something GPA or something equally unacceptable. I still have my transcripts, but I'm kind of afraid to know the actual figure. I did well in English because I loved it. I gave minimal effort towards everything else, although I had random, floating A’s that would appear when I suddenly felt behooved to try. My mathematical brain had been hermetically sealed since a humiliating experience in the 5th grade. Consequently, I failed Algebra I twice, including summer school. The third time I took it, I’m pretty sure my teachers threw their hands up and gifted me with a D just to get me out of their hair. Thankfully I passed Geometry, and in those days, that’s all you needed to graduate. I nearly did not graduate from high school at all, for a reason so stupid it still makes me laugh at myself on a regular basis. I failed gym. And then I failed gym. And then I failed gym again. Who the heck wants to change your clothes and then run around when you could sit in the sun and talk to your friends? My friends were smart enough to do the bare minimum to get through it. During my senior year, I was thrown a bone I totally didn't deserve…I got to be a TA for one of the coaches for PE credit. I kept his desk organized and I entered scores and stats into a ledger. I discovered one of the athletic office ladies was stealing from the hopper from the candy sales. I passed PE, and graduated from high school. Standing aside my friends who graduated with honors and earned scholarships, I got an actual diploma.
Looking back, it probably would have helped somewhat if I had actually attended school from time to time. I remember clearly our AP English teacher telling my best friend Renee on one of the many days I was absent, “If you talk to her, remind her that school is every day.” This is a phrase she still teases me with to this day. I was “sick” frequently. When we were able to drive, forget it…it would be McDonald's or Winchell's donuts during 1st period Spanish. Renee and I would routinely arrive 10 minutes before the period was over. We had a lovely little Japanese lady who taught Spanish, and every day we’d try to come up with new excuses. “The car broke down!” “We ran out of gas.” “We forgot homework and had to drive all the way back and by the time we got here…” Oh, that poor lady. She bought none of it of course, but would listen, roll her eyes and say, “Pobre sitas!”, which is roughly translates to “poor babies”. She passed us with C's, I have no idea how.
It also probably would have helped if, ummm, my parents had paid the slightest bit of attention to what I was doing with regard to school. I do remember my mom getting me an Algebra tutor at one time that I hated. He only came once. Beyond that, both of my parents appeared clueless regarding how I was doing at school. At one point, my mom did discover that I had been cutting classes on a regular basis and came up with a consequence. “If I find out you ditch class one more time, I’m disconnecting your phone.” Side note: I had my own phone line. I did not deserve my own phone line. These were the old days before call waiting, and I got my own phone line for one reason only. My mother wanted to occasionally use the phone, and that wasn’t happening with me on it at least 3-4 hours a day. 798-2729 should have never been, and certainly didn’t help my study skills since it was in my bedroom. Disconnecting my phone would have been like cutting off my arm at the time, but here’s the sad part. I was so 100% sure that my mother would not take the time to call the high school to see if I was attending my classes, that I cut class the very next day. I was right, she never called to check, and I continued to ditch. I’m not blaming my parents for my scholastic failures, I was totally responsible. I just intend to do things differently with my own kids.
So I continued to have my undeserved phone line in my own room, something that I would now consider for my own children in high school, maybe, if they are earning a 4.0 or above. Oh wait…they won’t need such a thing because they’ll have cell phones by then. In any case, they have the disadvantage of having a me as a mother who: A: Is so determined that my children do not follow in my footsteps in this particular area and am so adamant that they work up to their potential that it sometimes makes my head spin, and B: I work in the same school district in which they attend, and due to the remarkable technological advances of the present day, I can check to see if they attend each and every period by computer. I can check to see if they’ve gotten into any trouble. I can even see their report cards before they’re officially distributed. They’re screwed. Mwah ha ha ha!!! They’re going to college, come hell or high water, hopefully one they can choose from several options.
I’d always thought that I would go to UCSB in Santa Barbara, which was my ultimate goal. For some inexplicable reason, I thought it would just “happen” without having to work for it at all. Seriously. At some point during my senior year, I remember accepting that this dream was not going to happen and being crushed and confused. I wish I could remember how I found this place, but I learned about a small, Catholic, private, junior college in Palos Verdes. I applied, and was miraculously accepted. It was very expensive, and I wanted OUT of the house. I got to go away to “college”!
Marymount College Palos Verdes is not Loyola Marymount, which is actually a very good reputable school. Marymount College, where I attended, was a bit of a joke. I quickly learned that it was where rich parents sent their rich children who had been just as lazy and irresponsible as I had been. Maybe after two years, their kids would get their heads together and be able to transfer to USC, and the parents would no longer have to hang their heads in shame. I was in for the biggest culture shock of my young life. I was about as prepared for the people I was about to encounter as I would have been if I’d been dropped off for my freshman year in Mongolia. The first day I pulled into the parking lot of the school in my brown 1982 Datsun 210 amongst the Mercedes, BMW’s and Porches, I knew I had landed on a foreign planet. Although it was before the show’s existence, it was very much like a scene from Beverly Hills 90210. Every school I had ever attended in Pasadena was totally diverse and integrated, with every possible culture represented. My dad and mom’s neighborhoods were the same. I had friends who were Black, Hispanic, Japanese, Chinese, you name it. It was normal, and I thought the world was that way. I got to Marymount and everyone was WHITE. Really, really white. Wait, I stand corrected…there were some black students, I think there were 12, many of whom comprised the basketball team. Not only was everyone white, everyone was a kind of white I knew nothing about or had experienced. Rich. Arrogant. Racist. Entitled. Okay, okay, I’ll just say it. Assholes. I didn’t know how to talk to these people! The college itself sat up in Palos Verdes Estates, an unbelievably beautiful community with enormous mansions with expansive views of the ocean. The “dorms” were actually apartment buildings down the hill in San Pedro, a tad less upscale of a community than Palos Verdes. The apartments themselves were really nice, two bedroom, two bath, 4 students to each apartment. My first three roommates could not have been more different. A beautiful, wild party girl from Hawaii. A low-keyed, slightly arrogant chick from Alaska. And then a girl from Chula Vista with whom I shared a bedroom and bathroom, and the most descriptive word I can use for her is "stupid". That girl was just not a smart person, and she was a slovenly as she was dull. Very quickly, the beautiful Hawaiian girl found another Hawaiian girl and wanted to switch apartments. She was replaced by an absolutely beautiful black girl (one of the 12) who was somewhat stand-offish. We became friends ultimately, but it took a long time. In the meantime, we experienced grocery shopping, paying bills and utilities, and cleaning our own apartment for the first time. It was…interesting.
The college itself was filled with people I just could not relate to. I became friendly with some, mostly who lived in the same apartment building, but they knew nothing of my background or upbringing. As a result, some would let the most offensive, revolting racist jokes fly in my presence. I was shocked and offended, and I let the joke teller know. The next time we were all together, he began to tell another joke and then said, and I swear I am not making this up, “Well, I can’t tell this in front of her (me), she likes black people.” Why, yes, this is correct. As a matter of fact, I know every single one of them and like them all equally. I'm their white ambassador. For the love of God! One of my closest friends from high school, Mona, helped me move into my apartment during this time, and she happens to be black. She came around a corner holding some of my hand weights and genuinely frightened some of our fellow students. Rarrrrrr!!! Here comes a big beautiful black woman carrying weights, she’s probably going to jump us, run for your lives!!! We both got a pretty big kick out of it, actually. What had I done in deciding to go there? There was a period of time when I was writing letters to my best friend Renee and in each one there would be “An Actual Marymount Quote For The Day” segment. I only remember two. One young man, upon entering our apartment building to visit a friend had to show the supervising adult his ID. Sniffing with disgust, he said, “Oh my God, I could sell my WATCH and buy this building!” I remember that kid, and I hope someone eventually kicked his ass. The other was when I asked a classmate if she was ready for finals. This poor little thing said, “Oh my God, I was up doing lines all night just to stay awake and study!” ?????? Really? Is cocaine a study aid? I do know that cocaine was absolutely everywhere, I wrote to my friend that when you turned on the faucet in our apartment building, cocaine came out instead of water.
However, wonderful things were around the corner. I would like to thank two beautiful women for saving me that year. Cheryl was from Seattle, and we kept bumping into each other…she lived in the building, and we had some of the same classes. She was sweet and friendly and, amazingly, did not snort cocaine, so that was a plus. We became friends very quickly. Second semester, I changed apartments and roomed with her and her two other roommates, who were also very sweet, nice girls. We had a blast together. Granted, we drank like fish, so I don’t want to appear overly virtuous just because we didn’t snort cocaine.In fact, we concocted our own "cocktail" of Crystal Light and Bacardi. Yuck...makes me shudder, even to this day. I remember one night we were all at the beach, drunk, and trying to find each other as it was really dark. I yelled, “Where are you?” She yelled back, “Just turn left and keep walking!” I replied, “If I do that, I’ll walk into the ocean!!” There was a trip to Tijuana, that I probably wouldn't have a lot of recollection about due to the level of intoxication, other than the fact that I still have pictures. Yikes. There I am, 1988 or 1989, in my acid washed jeans and gigantic hair, flipping off the camera in almost every picture. Sniff... I'm so proud. During that trip, we were staying in some horrific motel and we came across a big spider or roach and I promptly sprayed in with my hairspray (which, according to the pictures at least, I had an endless supply of), and lighting it on FIRE. Oy. In the morning, we all woke up horrifically hung-over, but we thought we'd misplaced one of our friends. "Where's Jon?" Off in a corner, we heard a pathetic whimper, "I'm in hell..." A memorable experience for sure.
I also remember planning a trip to Catalina Island with some other folks, and Cheryl knocking on my door (this must have been first semester) and I’d overslept, and was hung-over (shocker). I tried to get out of it, but she made me go. The boat ride over was a little rough, but it ended up being one of the best days I remember from that bizarre year. We rented a little motorboat and went fishing in the harbor, actually caught some fish, and brought them home and grilled them up for dinner. It was delicious, and just one of those beautiful, perfect days. On my 19th birthday, she and our other roommates made me a cake and then she and I went to see “Say Anything” in the theater. We still quote lines from the movie to each other, actually, since it took place in Seattle and so much of it was filmed in Altadena, blocks from my dad's house. Crazy coincidence!
The other close friend I made I had at least one class with, but I honestly don’t remember exactly how we became friends. Lisa was from Boise. She lived in the building too, and in getting to know each other, we discovered that she also came from a much more middle class, integrated upbringing, and that Marymount was throwing her for a loop too. We became very close, so close in fact that she often joined my family at my dad’s house for holidays when she couldn’t afford or didn’t want to go home. She was regarded as family by my father, and they bonded quickly. This support was invaluable at the time, as she didn’t have a particularly close relationship with her own father at the time. She actually lived with us for a number of weeks one summer while we were both working part time jobs and trying to save money. She is a dear, dear friend to me, and flew from Idaho for my father’s funeral last year.
Cheryl and I only lasted a year at Marymount. I went back to Pasadena and attended the City College, planning to transfer to a 4 year school when I had enough credits. She retreated back to Washington and finished her schooling at Washington State. Lisa from Boise stuck it out for another year, during which we kept in constant contact, as Marymount was only about 45 minutes away with no traffic. After that, she transferred over to Loyola Marymount, the “real school”,and completed her degree there.
Without the friendship of these girls, I would have lost my mind, quit school entirely, or perhaps tried cocaine myself. The three of us never did, as we watched our other friends, one by one, get sucked into the trend. As a matter of fact, and Cheryl just reminded me of this, a number of these kids ended up getting hauled off to rehab my their parents. In fact, we got into the habit of singing "Another One Bites The Dust" every time we'd hear of another one. It was almost as though it was a crazy, rich white college kid rite of passage, going to rehab. Cheryl also reminded me of how tempted we were to run through the parking lot at the college and intentionally set off all the car alarms. Keep in mind when this was, the only cars that had alarms in 1988 were very expensive ones, and most of these kids had expensive cars of their own, or were driving their parent's cars after they'd decided to "upgrade" after a year of driving it. We never did it, but I sure wish we had!
I think we all kept each other strong, and reminded each other where we came from. We remained fairly grounded and kept each other from turning into strange, snobby pod-people. I am still very close to both of them to this day, and we’ve been friends for more than half our lives now. They were both to be in my wedding, but Lisa had a baby, and his first birthday was on the same day as my wedding. She was crushed, but I understood. Cheryl flew all night to Sacramento from Miami (where she had been living at the time), and was exhausted. She made it through the rehearsal, but I know she was fried. She stayed with my dad and I in our apartment, and on the morning of my wedding, she got up early and drove around in a city in which she’d never been to find a supermarket. She bought me yogurt, bagels, and juice, and made me eat them. THAT is a friend. I remember when Cheryl was in a long term relationship, and was horribly mistreated. That was the first time I actually felt like getting on a plane and getting into a physical fight with this dude, and I've never been in a physical fight. She is just a nice person. The word doesn't do her justice, but there are those people out there that are just sweet and good natured and don't have a mean bone in their body. So this jerk treating her badly wasn't just about hurting my friend, it was like a crime against humanity to me! She met a wonderful guy not long after this, got married, and had two of the most beautiful children I have ever seen. I'm so glad she got these things in her life, because in her goodness, she absolutely deserves every bit of it.
When my father passed last year and I was down at his house a couple days after, it occurred to me I hadn’t called Lisa yet. I sat at dining room table in my father’s house at which she and I had numerous home cooked meals and long hilarious conversations with my him and gave her a call. It was a Tuesday. She answered with, “Hey girl, this is bad news, isn’t it?” I validated her question, and she said, “You know, it’s weird. I was thinking about your dad on Sunday all day, I couldn’t get him out of my head. I almost called you.” I was silent for a few moments and said, “Lisa. He died on Sunday.” She and my dad loved each other so much, and they had a special connection. She was able to visit him in his last year of life, which I am so very grateful for. Lisa's son is 15 now, and while I have not had the privilege of seeing him for a number of years, he sounds like an incredible young man, and I know how proud she is. If I could choose one word for her, it would be strong. She has been through a lot of tragedy and heartache, but perseveres no matter what. I admire her more than she could possibly imagine.
So…my underachievement and laziness lead me to two of the best people, as well as the best friends I have ever had. Grace abounds. I’m convinced that God puts certain people in our lives for specific reasons. I don’t have the joy of seeing or talking to them that often, but they are always there in spirit, and I know that. Ten years could go by, and we pick up right where we left off. Those kinds of friendships don’t come along often. To the two of you, you know who you are, I love you SO much. Thank you for helping me keep my sanity. So had I applied myself and gotten into UCSB or Cal, I never would have met them. My life would be a much less rich place without them in it. God knows what he’s doing.
The irony, of course, is in having been such a joke of a student, I ended up in a professional career in education. Maybe it isn't ironic, maybe it's the reason why. I wanted to be a good counselor because I'd experienced such ineffective hacks calling themselves counselors as a kid. Maybe I want to encourage kids to reach their full potential in school despite family turmoil and possible disabilities because I never took advantage of the gifts I had to fully reach my potential. In any case, I know all of this was within God's hands, and I wouldn't change a bit of it now.
And just in case anyone was wondering, I really do like black people. ;)
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