THE ANALYZING YEARBOOKS SERIES: SIXTH GRADE

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Alright, so…I was seriously in need of a fucking pick-me-up today, and I’m not nearly ready to write anything about John Hughes yet, so I figured it was the right time to crack open some newly-shipped boxes and drag out my yearbooks from grades 6 -12.

Rather than just talk about the yearbooks or their innate content, though, I felt like analyzing the things that people wrote inside them. If you think about it, your yearbook is basically like a Comments section on an Internet article that’s all about you. In other words, it’s the tangible, visceral version of three insightful, entertaining responses surrounded by total fucking idiocy, a couple errant advertisements, and one asshole who just writes “FIRST!” (which, in the yearbook world, equates to, “Cows go moo, ducks go quack, I was the first to sign your crack.”).

Allow me to say this: this is one of the best things I have ever done in my life. These have been locked in closet at my dad’s office since I graduated college over seven (holy crap) years ago, and God knows how long it was that I went through them before that. If this doesn’t knock you back, I don’t know what will. So here we go: the thoughts and dreams of my peers of anywhere from eleven (Jesus Christ) to seventeen (fuck my life) years ago. All misspellings, punctuation and grammar will be kept as-is for posterity.

And the answer to your question is yes – I have indeed sent upwards of 743 Facebook Friend Requests since earlier tonight.

SIXTH GRADE – 1992 – Mechanicsburg Area Intermediate School

Fact: I was the LAST person to get my yearbook this year due to a clerical mixup, so there’s not a lot here, as everyone was obviously tired of signing shit at the point I approached them. Also, it seems as though the sixth grade versions of ourselves merely wanted to scrawl down our names and nothing else. And apparently we learned to scrawl said names with those fat, retard-sized Crayolas because all the signatures look like hell.

--“Jeff, have fun over the summer with someone! like a girl” – Gabe Staub (I’m relatively sure that neither myself nor Gabe would have had the first clue how to have fun with a girl in any meaningful way over that summer, but clearly the kid was ahead of the curve in motivation.)

--“This year was so awesome it’s not funny! We had the best time with Mr. Marsh, we talked him into everything! Have an awesome summer! – Steve! (Mr. Marsh is still, to this day, my favorite teacher ever. I don’t exactly remember what we talked him into, but apparently it was worth some fucking exclamation.)

--“Geoff – Are you trying to hit it off with Katie (EDITOR’S NOTE: I took occasion to write directly next to this ‘Nope,’ which confirms that I was, indeed, trying to hit it off with Katie. Well played, Sixth Grade Geoff.)? Anyway, have a great summer, but your a total pain, but your not that bad looking. PS – Tell Steve cool act! – Briana!” (As the years roll on, I find that there are fewer and fewer references to my good looks in these musings. Draw your own conclusions. Also, the “cool act” refers to the end of the year Talent Show where Steve Martin and I did a lip-synch to JUMP by Kriss Kross. Don’t hate.)

--“Geoff, Have a great summer! Good luck next year! It’s been a fun year with you in my class! – Shannon” (This is written in PERFECT tween girl cursive. Shannon obviously spent her year perfecting this, refusing to worry about what she’d write in people’s yearbooks and absolutely not giving a shit about me.)

--“Geof, You’re the BEST! Good luck with the girls you’re a total babe! – Katie” (This is the infamous Katie that Briana mentioned above. You can tell by the CAPS and the exclamation points that she’s fighting off some seriously repressed, latent pre-sexual angst. The present-day equivalent to sixth grade Geoff LaTulippe and Katie Fuchs are Harry and Sally, the best friends who fight with each other but absolutely refuse to fuck out of mutual hate/admiration/principle/lack of puberty. To Katie’s credit, though…even if she couldn’t spell my goddamned name, she let me look down her bathing suit every day at the Mechanicsburg pool for three summers. I know she knew I was looking. She knew I knew she knew I was looking. On the plus side, I became a master at hiding erections while shirtless, an awesome skill rendered useless to this day because my fledgling penis hasn’t grown since I was twelve. I miss those days, Fuchs.)

--“Geoff, To a nice friend, have a nice summer. – TJ Larkin” (That was nice.)

--“Have a great summer! (PS my little sister thinks your cute) – Susan” (My first thought after reading this: “I wonder which Susan this was and if her sister still likes me.” Do I need professional help? I don’t not.)

--“Geoff, Have a great summer. See you next year! – Shawn Minnich (How Shawn and Shannon never got together is question worthy of its own UNSOLVED MYSTERIES episode.)

--“Have a kick ass summer – Sam” (I wish I could scan this so you could see how it was written – each word was written above and to the right of the word that came before it and the sentence floats across half a page. It should come as no surprise to anyone that Sam was the kid in sixth grade who everyone described as “probably on drugs” before we even knew what that looked like.)

--“Steve get some women this summer! – Wes Reohr” (This was a confusing time for Wes.)

--“Geoff, To a guy I have no idea who he is But Have a great summer. Love, Kerrie” (Naturally, this was written to me by the girl who I fawned over all fucking year. She really, honestly had no clue who I was, and I probably pissed myself a little bit just asking her to sign my book. Eventually, though, we did get to know each other. The summer after this, she took pity on me and, laughing, attempted to French kiss me in the Rakestraw’s parking lot. I was so terrified I never opened my teeth and just barely managed to not come in my Umbros.)

That was fun. On to Seventh Grade…