looking backward into those years past
drawn in inks black and blue and red
scrawled in the empty space between all
the good wishes and ads for the
future
sentiment and names barely
remembered
looking back between pages of
pictures
of slightly familiar faces
strangers smiling
she most this and he likely to do
that
the smart ones pretty ones and the
clown
most funny holding footballs basketballs
posies of pink dressed in tulle remembering
it was all about filling the blank
page
smiles....yearbooks on the brain...tis the season...i really need to pull mine out when i next go home...and you def did not want a blank page...smiles..
ReplyDeletewill read your story in the morning...or tonight...
Ha! Oh, yes. Those pages had to be filled, even if the written words were idiotic. This takes me back.
ReplyDeleteWe never had yearbooks in our schools in the UK. Don't know if they do now or not but, I would imagine it would hurt to not have everyone want to sign it for you.
ReplyDeleteMust bring back some nice memories too?
I think I lost mine in all the moving ~ But yes, no blank pages there ~
ReplyDeleteI always felt a little cheated because I went to an all girl high school. Still, the year book was important. And I think I filled those pages nicely. I enjoyed reading this. Good writing.
ReplyDeleteI know nothing of year books being British, but your poem describes them so well and what they meant.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was VERY young and graduating from Grade School, we had "Autograph Books", as well as Yearbooks. The Autograph Book was the place where you signed your name along with a brief and pithy statement that would be indelibly marked on the soul of the recipient. Everybody signed everybody else's Autograph Book.
ReplyDeleteMy Grandfather, a man who seldom addressed me directly, and NEVER said a kind word to me, wrote two things in my Autograph Book: "A friend knows everything about you and likes you anyway" and "Success is getting up once oftener than you fall down".
I don't remember anything anybody else wrote in my book - but I do remember that.
I always felt bad for the kids who couldn't fill their pages, the quiet kids whose lives evolved at the fringe of school life. I hope they eventually managed to find something to fill the whitened gaps.
ReplyDeleteOh yes. Takes me back too. It's awful, but I don't remember what most of the people in my yearbook looked like now. Yet they seemed so important to me at the time. Some of the comments left, however, were quite profound. Thanks for taking me down memory lane....
ReplyDelete... and sometimes it still is.
ReplyDeleteNicely done, Patty. ;-) Enjoyed.
I missed out. No such thing as year books here when I left school. I still keep in touch with a load of school friends though
ReplyDelete