Throwback Thursday: 8th Grade Mo Was the Mayor of Munchkin City (and a non-complainer)

In elementary school, I had four hobbies: reading¹, drinking Dr Pepper¹, playing softball, and participating in school plays. My interest in the latter began with my starring turn as the eponymous rabbit in my second grade class’s production of Bunny Sue (a performance that required a great deal of hopping and not much else) and did not wane until high school when I realized that being in possession of a booming speaking voice and having the ability to easily memorize lines did not necessarily make one a great actress². Over the years I performed in a number of theatrical masterpieces ranging from Old King Cole (I was the King himself and got to wear a crown!) to The Twelve Dancing Princesses (another crown!!) to some weird fantasy nonsense called The Evil Eye of Gondor that involved a bunch of townspeople standing up to some giant eyeball³ (I got to wear…a really boring tan tunic), and while I certainly preferred to be the star of the show, I always had a great time no matter what my role.

(As a sidenote, considering all the confidence and self-esteem issues I had as a child, my enjoyment of these plays and particularly my desire for leading roles is surprising to me in retrospect! It seems incongruous with everything I know about my former fragile emotional state. I’ll make a note of it for future analysis.)

By the time eighth grade rolled around, I was a seasoned veteran. When the local children’s community theater program announced that they’d be staging a production of The Wizard of Oz, I was beside myself with excitement: the chance to be in a play that was actually a real famous story and not just some inane drivel someone wrote specifically for schoolchildren to perform⁴! And surely it would provide the opportunity to wear some fantastic costumes! I could not wait for rehearsals to begin.

Now, while I mentioned earlier that my usual goal was to have the biggest part possible, I knew that in this case I’d have to be satisfied with some background work. Unlike all the other plays I’d been in, The Wizard of Oz is, of course, a musical. And musicals, obviously, require singing, and preferably by someone who can carry a tune. I am not that person. I know this. I have always known this. I had no delusions about my lack of talent and certainly had no aspirations of playing Dorothy or Glenda or any of those exciting roles, so when casting was announced and I saw that I’d been tasked with playing the Mayor of Munchkin City, I was perfectly happy. I had some fun lines to say and got to be in a number of major scenes — how could I complain?

And I was right about the costumes. My then-toddler cousin summed up my Mayor ensemble thusly: “Mo funny hat!”

above: greeting my family after one of the performances. My older sisters look like they thoroughly enjoyed the show, but the twins — especially Jamie there on the left — were clearly unimpressed; I can only assume they were jealous of my costume. Unfortunately for all of us, I was not permitted to keep the hat.

The best part about my experience in The Wizard of Oz wasn’t actually the lines or the hat or the performances themselves, although those were all quite exciting (especially that GIANT SILVER HAT⁵). About a week or so into rehearsals, the director pulled me aside during a break and asked me if I was happy with my part. Confused, I replied that of course I was pleased to play the Mayor (again, THAT HAT!) and was having a great time. He went on to inform me that I was virtually the only castmember who hadn’t come to him to complain about their role after casting — apparently, everyone was angling for better parts or more lines while I was just relieved that my complete lack of singing talent didn’t preclude me from participating altogether. He told me he appreciated my maturity and graciousness (direct quote!) and that I was doing a great job as the Mayor, then sent me on my way. The whole interaction lasted less than ninety seconds, but even 17 years later I remember it more vividly than I remember the play itself. There was something so validating about being complimented for simply being me (it had honestly never crossed my mind to complain or to be anything less than happy with what I was offered) — it’s a rare thing to have your disposition or temperament acknowledged, and I still count it as one of the best compliments I’ve received.

Seriously, though: who would complain about getting to wear that hat?

…………………………………

Footnotes:

¹My love of literature and sugary carbonated beverages persists to this day. Put them together and you’ve got my ideal Saturday afternoon! PARTY TIME!

²That said, I would kill to participate in a high school play right now. I’m pretty young-looking, right? I could totally pass.

³I am not exaggerating when I say that I literally have NO IDEA what that play was about. And I was in it! And played a principle role! No clue.

⁴I’m looking at you, Evil Eye of Gondor.

⁵It was really heavy.

Throwback Thursday: High School Mo Showed a Lot of Skin

The other night, my friend and I took a little journey down memory lane and pored through our senior yearbook.

Big mistake.

Apparently, I had forgotten that I had some serious sartorial crises in my teens — virtually every photo of me had us cackling while I cried, “what am I wearing?!” And I’m not just talking about your run-of-the-mill embarrassing teenaged fashion choices here, kids. My problem wasn’t wearing too much flannel or one too many pairs of overalls; no, my fashion crime was shopping exclusively in the slut section of Forever 21. According to the photo evidence, between the ages of 15 and 18 I found anything that covered up more than 15% of my body to be completely unacceptable. My midriff was constantly exposed. My necklines were so low no bra could possibly be contained. There were spaghetti straps at every turn. HELP!

The really baffling thing is that despite the skank-tastic wardrobe, High School Mo was a total square. I never went to parties, was shocked and scandalized at the thought of people my age having sex, and I most certainly did not have an endless string of potential suitors chasing after me. So what the hell was I doing dressing like 2007 Nicole Richie?!

Enjoy, for example, this backless little number that amounted to little more than a handkerchief and a couple of shoestrings:

I believe this photo was taken at a Souplantation, which makes it all the more cringe-worthy. Who wears club-wear to eat unlimited salad and chili?! Sixteen-year-olds who spend too much money at Forever 21, that’s who.

At least I didn’t wear that top to school, I suppose. Of course, my schoolwear wasn’t much better:

Not only is that a cropped turtleneck (who knew those existed?!), but it appears that I determined those ill-fitting jeans to be too high-waisted for my tastes, because I cut off the waistband. God forbid there be an extra inch of fabric in the 12″ expanse between my pants and my shirt — that would be hideous!

This next photo was technically taken sometime during my first year of college, but I most definitely wore this very outfit back in high school, so I am including it:

Is that a four-year-old’s shirt I’m wearing? Or the top half of a bathing suit, maybe? I’m pretty punk rock with that studded belt, at least.

Finally, I’ll leave you with this gem — my senior prom dress:

It’s backless (sadly not visible from this angle), there’s a slit practically up to my waist, and it cost me $17 at Charlotte Russe. I wore it to prom. Beat that, bitches.

Throwback Thursday: See Bubba Grow

On New Years day 2012, I had a teeny tiny baby (and giant boobs from breastfeeding…ah, good times). I don’t know what happened, but by January of 2013, I had a walking, talking, toddler, and now, one year later, there’s a giant toy-hoarding preschooler residing in my house. If you ever want to feel really nostalgic and sad, just look at some old photos of your child: it’s positively heart-wrenching.

Based on the above-depicted progression, I’m assuming that this time next year he’ll be sixteen and driving my car.

Throwback Thursday: Sixth Grade Mo Had Deep Thoughts (and ADD)

On the first day of sixth grade, my language arts teacher handed out blank composition books and announced an exciting year-long project: we would use the notebooks to respond to writing prompts she’d provide periodically in class, then turn them in quarterly for her to read. How fun! I got to work doodling all over my fresh book immediately (by the time the year was through, I had filled up two entire books):

Man, I really missed my calling as an artist or graphic designer.

Being a huge nerd, I really was quite excited about the project. I liked writing, and the idea of a year-long assignment seemed so grown-up. I took it very seriously and looked forward to the days when our teacher would tell us to take out our notebooks and reply to a prompt she had written on the blackboard. For example, here’s my response to a prompt on best friends:

My friend, Brittany, is my best friend for many reasons. She is very loyal. I’ve known her since 2nd grade and she’s never left me. She’s funny when I’m sad or mad, and she’s also cheerful. She isn’t usually sad. It’s very fun to be with a cheerful person.

See? Please admire my accurate spelling, ambitious (if not 100% correct) use of commas, and the appropriately introspective tone to match the spirit of the assignment. (On a sidenote, I also urge you to take a moment to acknowledge my comically low standards for friendship. Brittany really was a great friend, but apparently just not ditching me in favor of cooler people and not being a total Debbie Downer was pretty much all I required.)

All quarter long, I dutifully answered each prompt and eagerly anticipated the day I’d get to turn my journal in for its review. I imagined my teacher reading through my thoughtful replies, sagely nodding at my intelligence and maturity and thinking to herself, “ah, that Maureen! What a gem of a student! If only all my students could be like her!”

And then about two days before it was time to turn them in, I overheard a conversation between some classmates and realized I had missed a crucial component of the assignment: we were supposed to be writing in these stupid things EVERY SINGLE SCHOOLDAY, not just when the teacher provided a prompt on the blackboard! Evidently, on the days when no prompt was provided, we were just supposed to get creative and write about something that happened that day or whatever was on our mind.

Whoops.

You see, I have a serious case of ADD, which unfortunately went undiagnosed until I was 25 years old. My school career was riddled with situations like this, where I zoned out and completely missed the instructions for an assignment or sat through an entire lecture and then later realized I had taken precisely zero notes (or that my notes made no sense) and thus had retained absolutely no information whatsoever. The good news is that by sixth grade, even though I didn’t know that my focus issues were caused by an actual diagnosable and treatable condition, I was familiar with the pattern and wasn’t all that shocked to discover that I had missed the instructions. As soon as I realized my mistake, I sprung into action and spent the next two nights making up journal entries for the previous two months.

Obviously, I couldn’t remember what I had been doing on each of those days, so I simply racked my brain for topics I thought might belong in a journal. I actually consider it a blessing in disguise that I initially missed the instructions, because the entries I came up with during that two-day crunch time are far more entertaining that anything I wrote during the rest of the year when I was actually doing the assignment daily as intended. Here’s a sampling:

I wonder what it’s going to be like in the future. I mean, it seems fine right now, but they still keep coming up with “breakthrough” technology. If we already have computers that cheack [sic] your spelling, VCRs that turn themselves on and off, radios that have remote controlls [sic], how much better could you possibly get?

I really could have used one of those spell-cheaking computers. Also, who the hell has a remote-control radio?! I don’t even think that’s a thing. And why on earth would I think that a remote-controlled radio (if they even existed; I’m dubious) was the best that technology had to offer?

I love to read. It’s like, my hobby. I read while I eat, drink Dr. Pepper, I even read while I watch TV. It’s really fun and exciting. I could read all day!

Dudes, I wasn’t lying. Please note the book, the snack, and the cup of Dr. Pepper:

See how FUN and EXCITING reading is? (PS: I still do this now; you could swing by my house on a Saturday evening and recreate this exact same photo, save, perhaps, for the sweet purple scrunchie.)

I wonder why the CTBS test makes you use a No. 2 pencil? Why not a 2.5 pencil? Who invented CTBS tests anyway? They seem dumb to me. They’re so easy, and they don’t challenge you. And they make you fill out so much info about yourself! It’s really quite boring, and it takes up HOURS of your time. What a waste!!

I was ahead of my time with that political stance against standardized testing. I also like my humble-brag about the tests being too easy for my brilliant mind. The test must have lacked a spelling section.

If I had to choose between being blind or deaf, I’d choose to be deaf because when you’re blind, you can’t do any of the things that you would normally do: reading, walking on your own, watching TV, etc etc. But if you’re deaf you can still drive, walk, read, etc. You just can’t hear the doorbell or the telephone, but you can buy phones that light up.

See, deaf people should never complain. All they have to do is buy a light-up telephone and their problems are solved! If you go blind, on the other hand…good luck, because your life is totally going to suck. You can’t even watch TV!

 

If you’re curious, my teacher gave my journal a 100% score that quarter, even though she had to have realized that I fucked up and did it wrong since all the prompted entries came first and were followed by a barrage of hastily-scribbled un-dated ramblings. I guess she was just that impressed by my deep thoughts!

Can you blame her? Just look at that seriously studious student!

Throwback Thursday: Junior High Mo Had Some Hair Problems

In all my thirty years, I think I’ve had about six truly good hair days. When I was young, my hair wasn’t too troublesome, but there was an awful lot of it and the waviness had a tendency to cross over into frizz-ball territory on occasion. Until I was in 7th grade, my hair pretty much looked like this all the time:

Sure, I wasn’t a Pantene model, but I didn’t look like a freakshow or anything (multi-colored braces aside).

And then one day in seventh grade, literally overnight, my hair changed and my previously slightly-frizzy waves became a mess of super-tight ringlet curls. The bad news is, I did not know what one was supposed to do with curly hair, and neither did anyone else in my family (either that or they DID know and were just super-cruel and liked to watch me suffer), so I did what I’d always done with my hair:

I BRUSHED IT.

Did you know that you are not, under any circumstances, supposed to brush curly hair? Especially if the curly hair in question is the thickest, most voluminous hair on the planet?

This is what happens when you brush out thick, curly hair:

(FYI, I wasn’t exaggerating when I said that my hair changed overnight. The above photo was taken just weeks after the photo at the top in which my hair looks semi-normal!)

You guys, it was bad. How did my mother let me out of the house?! And why didn’t anyone help me? I think we have to place some blame on my friends and family, right? On a related note, how did I even manage to make any friends looking like that¹?

I wish I could say that I quickly figured out how to deal with my curly mane, but that would be a lie. Here I am an entire year later, still not knowing what to do (and apparently still oblivious to how ridiculous I looked — I look totally happy and not at all embarrassed to be photographed like I should have been!):

This nonsense lasted all the way through 8th grade. Here I am again with my dear friend Caitlin on the day of our 8th grade graduation:

To make matters worse, as you can see above, at some point in 8th grade I used what appears to be a gallon of Sun-In to lighten my hair. It totally improved the situation, right?

Blessedly, at some point in between 8th and 9th grade, my hair calmed down a tiny bit and I got in the habit of wearing ponytails all the time (why did I not think of that before?). I consider it a stroke of supreme good luck that my hair issues were at their worst at a time when I was immature enough to not give a shit about what I looked like — believe it or not, I never gave a second thought to my frightening appearance at the time! When I look back on these pictures, though, I kind of want to cry from retroactive shame². On the bright side, I suppose it’s nice that we can be certain that my friends liked me for my charming personality, because they definitely weren’t hanging around me in hopes that my coolness would rub off on them.

That said, I’m going to call Caitlin up right now and yell at her for not telling me to put my hair in a freakin’ ponytail in 7th grade. YOU CALL YOURSELF A FRIEND?!

…………………………………

Footnotes:

¹Perhaps they just wanted to hang out in my awesome bedroom. Please check out the SWEET 1989 Gameboy and note that my decor included a fried egg candle on the shelf behind me.

²I actually did cry at the sight of one of these photos once! When my little sisters turned 21, Jamie made a slideshow containing photos of the two of them throughout the years, and she included the photo of the three of us in overalls pictured above. When she played the slideshow at their party, I literally cried embarrassed-tears when it came up. In other news, I’m insane.

Throwback Thursday: 4th Grade Mo Still Likes Laughing At People

It took me a while to get on board, but look at me now: I am officially 100% on the #TBT bandwagon!

(Primarily because I have a lot of funny old photos of myself wearing parrot earrings that need to be shared, but no matter.)

Last week I shared the survey I filled out at the end of second grade, a treasure that exposed my love for math, reading, and laughing at the misfortune of others. I’m happy to report that, like my second grade teacher, my fourth grade teacher also foresaw the potential entertainment that a book full of questionnaires could provide decades in the future! I’m similarly pleased that my mother was wise enough to preserve these fine memories — such blessed prescience. Let’s check in on Fourth Grade Mo and see if her nerdiness (or her spelling) improved:

Doesn’t look like it. Let’s examine further:

1) Favorite sport to play: soft-ball

Favorite punctuation mark: hy-phen.

probably a strike-out…

2) Favorite book this year: Mandy

A fantastic book that I truly loved and re-read countless times (and is in fact sitting on my book shelf to this very day!), but I’m honestly surprised that I didn’t mention The Babysitters Club. Maybe I thought Mandy sounded smarter, which is silly since we all know that the girls in the BSC were the most brilliant and resourceful middle schoolers in literary history!

3) Book(s) I plan to read this summer: The Phantom Tolbooth [sic], The battle for the castle

I can confirm that I followed through on my promise to read the former, but I have no recollection of the latter and am going to hazard a guess that I opted for some more BSC instead.

4) Vacation and activity plans for summer: go to disneyland, stay at a cabin in Lake Arrowhead

That sounds fun and all, but I’m getting concerned about my obviously tenuous grasp on the rules of capitalization at this point. I committed to capitals on The Phantom Tollbooth above, but lost it on the second book. Then I knew that Lake Arrowhead should be capitalized, but didn’t think Disneyland qualified? Come on, Fourth Grade Mo!

5) Favorite Movie: A League Of Their Own. (The Mighty Ducks)

I cannot express how giddy with glee this response makes me. ALOTO is written in cursive and was clearly my initial reply to this query, but then it appears that I gave the question further consideration and went back to show “The Mighty Ducks” some love. The fact that I enjoyed TMD enough to call it one of my favorite movies (second only to ALOTO!) is amusing in and of itself, but the way it’s written — as if “The Mighty Ducks” was the subtitle of an epic softball (soft-ball)/hockey mash-up — makes me cackle heartily every time I think of it.

6) My greatest challenge this year was: Doing those Dumb bartering comics for social studies.

Tell us how you really feel, Fourth Grade Mo! I actually remember this assignment vividly, and to say that it was my greatest challenge of the year was sadly not an exaggeration. The assignment was simple enough — to create a little comic strip that illustrated the concept of bartering — but despite understanding exactly what needed to be done, I agonized over it as if it were the SATs¹. I am not good with open-ended creative-type things and I stymied myself by overthinking it. I drove myself into a tearful tizzy trying to come up with the perfect example of bartering (made more difficult by the fact that for some reason I felt that the storyline needed to be believable, i.e. a tale of bartering that I myself had actually participated in) and then trying to make the little stick figure drawings look exactly how I thought a real comic should look (a goal that was doomed from the start considering my known lack of artistic skill). I ended up drawing a story about my neighbor and I trading baseball cards and I cried when I turned it in because I never actually traded baseball cards with anyone and plus the damn thing looked godawful.

Fourth Grade Mo had some issues, mmmkay?

(And again with the random capital letters! I suppose I felt that the aforementioned comic assignment was so dumb that it needed to stand out a bit more.)

7) Some of my accomplishments this year: Being Old King Cole, being Jennifer, reading over 80 books.

That’s right, I played Old King Cole in a class play. I believe there was a crown involved. I also played the role of Jennifer in a play whose name and plot I cannot recall, but I do remember that my costume consisted of pajamas, and that was pretty cool.

8) Some things I really enjoyed this year: both of our plays, reading, going to Lazy W. ranch, writing, and (I don’t know why) doing pentominos.

OK, first of all, Petonimos are awesome — not sure why I felt the need to act coy about my love for those little slices of math heaven. Second, pretending that I enjoyed our class trip to Lazy W. Ranch was a bald-faced lie and I’m shocked at my audacious attempt to re-write history. As has been discussed on this blog numerous times, I was the most sensitive and homesick-prone child to have ever walked the planet, and obviously I hated that overnight adventure! Nice try, Fourth Grade Mo.

Hanging out in a fort in my own house was as much traveling as I could tolerate².

9) A funny thing that happened this year was: When Julie was coming in from the computar [sic] lab and fell over a chair and landed flat on her face.

What is wrong with me?! When I cited Alberto’s puke-fest as the funniest moment of second grade I figured we could chalk that up to second graders being immature, but apparently I was no better two years later. Poor Julie. To be fair, she was my friend (it’s not like I was mocking her; it’s just funny when people fall down!) and she wasn’t injured in the fall. But still. Come on.

10) Advice to future fourth graders: If you get sick you could miss something funny.

YOU GUYS. This is the EXACT same advice I gave to future second graders two years prior! I must have missed something truly hilarious while out sick one time and wanted to make sure such a tragedy would never befall me, or anyone else, again.

11) What I am looking forward to in fifth grade: switching classes.

I suppose I thought going to different classes for math, science, etc would spice things up a bit. I learned quickly that having to lug your backpack around to different classrooms all day was just a pain in the ass.

12) Any further remarks: If you get Mrs. apRoberts, you’ll have the funnest school year of your life!

As long as you don’t get sick and miss someone falling on their face, of course!

Ah, Fourth Grade Mo. If only I could go back and tell her not to stress so much about that damn bartering comic, or that she should have pretended to be sick to get out of going to the Lazy W. Ranch! Also, I could have warned her that those dangly parrot earrings were a bit much:

On second thought, no: the earrings are timeless and serve as a welcome distraction from the comically large buckteeth.

……………………………………

Footnotes:

¹Ironically, by the time I got to high school I no longer cared about such things and didn’t spend so much as thirty seconds preparing for the SATs.

²Also note that I am reading a book here — all that talk about reading was no joke! Who builds a super-cool fort and then just sits there and reads in it?! Fourth Grade Mo, that’s who.

Throwback Thursday: Second Grade Survey

Like most trends, I’m about a year late to the “Throwback Thursday” party. The good news is that I’ve got a doozy here that totally makes up for the fact that I didn’t even put together why people were typing #TBT next to old photos of themselves until like a week ago.

What we have here is a questionnaire I filled out at the end of second grade, which was compiled in a cute little memory book along with surveys and photos from the rest of my class:

(Sorry about the wonkiness of the scan; the page is part of a spiral-bound book and I couldn’t be bothered to spend more than eight seconds setting it up in the scanner. Remember, this is a half-assed blog I’m running over here.)

Let’s dive in, shall we?

1) The best thing that happened during second grade was: The Get hoppin play

Solid answer, second grade Mo. Get Hoppin’ was an extremely professional theatrical production put on by our class in the school cafeteria. It enjoyed a run of precisely one performance, which I believe took place at 10am (which thespians everywhere know is the prime time for live theatre).

The plot surrounded an obnoxious little bunny named Bunny Sue who, for reasons unknown, refused to hop. Her bunny siblings were pissed at her bad attitude, and I can’t say I blame them. Get your shit together, Sue! I don’t remember the specifics, but after being yelled at by her siblings and coddled by her parents (on whom the blame for Sue’s spoiled antics should really lie), there was an encounter with a wise bird or something and eventually the little bitch started hopping.

I was Bunny Sue:

2) The worst thing was: waiting for our play

Obviously.

3) One of the funniest things that happened this year is: when Alberto threw up

I REMEMBER THIS VIVIDLY! Poor Alberto puked right on his desk in the middle of class. I can’t remember the name of the kid who was sitting next to him, but I do remember the priceless look on his face as he jumped up and tried to escape the onslaught.

The BEST part of this, though, is that almost every single other kid in the class also reported this as the funniest moment of the year! Even Alberto himself answered “when I threw up.” It’s the highlight of this memory book, no doubt.

4) One of the saddest things was: being sick and missing school.

Mo, you’re a loser.

5) My favorite subject was….because….: Math, becouse I like working with numbers.

Well, we can see that I did not like working with spelling.

6) The hardest thing that I had to do this year was: learning division

But it was very rewarding, apparently?

7) The easiest thing was: learning how to do sudtraction.

Suck it, division. And spelling.

8) I’ll never forget the time that: Alberto threw up

I haven’t!

9) Some advice I’d like to pass on to future second graders is: don’t get sick becouse you might miss something funny.

Who cares about all the learning you might miss, or your health, for that matter? No, the biggest problem with getting sick is that you might miss something funny, like Alberto throwing up again.

(And man, I really wanted “because” to be spelled with an “o”!)

10) What I am looking forward to in third grade is: doing million minuts of reading

All year long in second grade, I watched the third graders rack up stickers as part of this “Million Minutes of Reading” program. I was a big reader and I was certain that when my time to participate finally came, I could read more than any other third grader. There was a contest element to it (prizes were involved, I believe) and I literally looked forward to it all year, convinced I would be victorious.

I’m bitter to this day that I wound up finishing in second place by a margin of, like, three stickers (which represented the number of books read, or possibly the number of pages). IF ONLY I HAD MADE IT TO THE LIBRARY TO CHECK OUT BABYSITTERS CLUB BOOKS JUST ONE MORE TIME!!!!!

 

And there you have it, folks: my seven-year-old self was a math-lovin’, poor-spellin’, book-readin’ nerd who enjoyed nothing more than laughing at people who throw up in public.

Just for good #TBT measure, here are two more photos from second grade to complete your visual: