Not that I am planning a run for high office, or suspect I am about to be appointed to a position of public trust, but I did put in some time last night reviewing my high school yearbook. I didn't see anything disqualifying in connection to myself. In the whole book there was only one picture of anyone in black face. It was a teacher in front of a few bored looking kids, and, since he wasn't standing next to someone in a KKK hood, it's possible there is an innocent explanation.
Besides the predictable sensation of nostalgia, and the recurring question about "wonder what became of him/her," I got a lot of chuckles from the editorial content. Lots of pictures of two or three or four kids, one or two or three of whom are identified by name in the caption. It must have just depended upon whether the caption-writer happened to know you or not. Pounding the pavement in order to find out someone's name? Not going to do it. There are over 1500 kids in the school and the yearbook has deadlines!
The yearbook headlines are not up to the standards of the New York tabloids. Here are some examples:
"Art Department Has New Member" (nothing on page identifies the new member)
"Cooks And Janitors Work Hard"
"Rousted Spirit Alive At Homecoming" (suggesting that "spirt" had been slumbering)
"Many Students Join Ski Club" (you don't say!)
"Osterndorf is New Superintendent" (should have added, "but outworked by cooks, janitors")
"On-The-Job Is 'Hire' Education" (not like they didn't have it in them to try!)
I make two appearances. One is my senior picture, for which I wore a plaid jacket and a huge bow tie. I vaguely remember borrowing them from a stylish neighbor. My last name is Jorgenson, so I should have appeared right after classmate Jill Jorgensen, with whom I worked at Ponderosa Steakhouse, but my picture is just before hers. Oddly, two years behind us were both my sister and Jill's brother, and sure enough, their pictures are reversed, too. I had a brief reverie about working at Ponderosa. Soon as the last customer was out and the doors locked, the manager would go to his trunk and bring in a case of beer, which he was cool about sharing with the high-school help. My parents were of the kind who knew when I was due home, so I'd quaff one off and then take one for the road. Once, riding home on my bike in the dark, pedaling no-handed the better to drink my boss's beer, I was accosted by one of Columbia Heights's finest, who followed me in his squad to my house, where he went to the door with me and explained to my dad the regrettable circumstances necessitating the interview. I was released into dad's custody, and I think he didn't feel comfortable dressing me down while in his pajamas. To protect the top dog at the local Ponderosa, I was ready to lie coolly about where I got the beer, but I didn't even have to do that.
So I survived to have my picture taken with the basketball team, my other appearance in the yearbook. "Basketball Team Goes To State" the headline above our picture incorrectly announces. We got within two wins of qualifying for the state tournament, and for some reason the region semifinal, which we lost to Minneapolis North, was played at a professional sports venue--the Met Sports Center, in Bloomington, where the North Stars and the Twin Cities' ABA franchises played in the days before the facility was razed to make room for the Mall of America. The yearbook staffer probably mistook the big arena for the state tournament. Fake news!
In the picture, my teammates and I all peer out stonily from beneath our hair. I think our coach had some rule about how long your hair could be, and it was cool--manly--to keep yours just a little longer than the rule, strictly speaking, permitted. Maybe we're in the neighborhood of an explanation for the yearbook-related troubles of the Governor of Virginia and the newest member of the Supreme Court. I'm sure, for example, that Justice Kavanaugh assaulted that woman at the high-school beer party, but he probably wouldn't have done it if his football teammate hadn't been there to witness him passing some kind of ass-stupid masculinity test. As kids and young men, we weren't that bad alone, but in a group picture for an athletic team we all glared like criminals. The fellows on the cross country team smiled for their picture, but it's not a very macho sport, and anyway, according to the headline above their picture, "Rebuilding Year For Hites In Cross Country."
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