Do you remember 6th grade?

When was the last time you looked at your sixth grade yearbook?  I'm looking at mine right now.


Wow.  I can't believe how young we look--but most of us haven't changed much.  That's the beauty of Facebook.  The class of 2001 doesn't have to wait for our upcoming reunion this summer.  Anytime we want to do a "Where Are They Now?" we just get online.  I'd say 90% of the people I wonder about are on there.  


As a Kid Who Moved Alot and attended two different high schools, I have the pleasure (?) of having not one, but two class reunions (actually 3 if you count my husband who is also a '01 grad).  And both my classes are planning them through Facebook.  It gives us the unique pleasure of giving feedback to our peers who are doing the planning--dates, locations, music, etc.  Whereas my parents (whose graduate years I won't reveal but we'll say it was around Woodstock) just get a piece of paper in the mail with a date, time and location.


I ramble.  My point is this--it's really strange to look back at people through adult eyes.  Sometimes you wonder why you weren't friends with certain people--or why you were.  Sometimes you wonder why you never got to know people who looked nice.  Or why you never knew that the boy you had a crush on clearly *ahem* batted for the other team.  Looking back, I wonder about that as I look at the teacher page as well.  There was one teacher in particular (and I know all of you who went to SMS in the mid-90s know exactly who I mean) who we all KNEW something was wrong (she was a very masculine woman) but we didn't exactly know what that meant.  That world wasn't really talked about until high school, and even then, it was Wisconsin.  People didn't really go around bragging about it.


Wow, off track again.  Who would have thought?  Anyway, most people probably try to forget 6th grade, and all of middle/junior/senior high school.  I'm not saying it was always a pleasant experience, but there are still fond memories.  I've written about some of them on this blog.  And they won't leave me alone.


I guess I'm stuck somewhere between ages 12 and 18.  At least, that's what I keep writing about.  One of my latest projects is about a boy in the sixth grade, at SMS in 1994.  Hmm, wonder where that came from?  It isn't really based on anyone I knew at SMS, in fact it's a little bit written if I had been a boy.  He's definitely got some traits of my husband, too.  It's a little bit hard to write from a boy's perspective, because even though I was always friends with the boys, I was still a girly girl.  Sometimes I don't get how they think.  For instance I asked my husband if my character thought about sex too much.  His answer was "not enough."  


Wow.  I always knew guys thought about sex a lot, but at 12 I didn't think they thought about it that much.  That was an eye opener.


One of my favorite authors, Sarah Dessen, said awhile back that if you like to write, then you should read what you write so you can see what your peers are doing.  Which means every time I got to the library I'm in the Young Adult section.  I'm only a little embarrassed, but I love to read that stuff.  I guess I wouldn't write it if I didn't.  But I didn't get to go to the library recently, so I was reading the things in my collection.  What I have in my collection is from the late 80s and early 90s, but the boys are the right age.  And the books are hilarious.  I don't know if anyone has ever read Barbra Park, but she is probably the funniest author I've ever read.  "Almost Starring Skinnybones" is one of the few books ever that has made me laugh out loud.  If you haven't read it, I would suggest that you do.  Even if you're an adult.  Pretend it's for your kids even if you don't have any.  You might someday.


So my dilemma is that a lot of books written for this age group are funny and not too much about what kids are really thinking about.  I like to write about what they're really thinking and feeling.  But when kids are really thinking about sex, how do you do that?  Or do you just ignore it?


I haven't figured out what the balance is yet.  I need more research.


So here's to the class of 2001, all the way back in 1994.  Fist bump to those of us who had really, really big bangs.