10
Ridiculous Things that Happen at Small Town High Schools
March
14, 2014
The
author’s “small town high school” was in Oregon, but it’s safe to say several
of these apply to small town Nebraska.
1. You
graduate with the exact same people you met on the first day of kindergarten. Small towns tend to be
insular places, which means–at the risk of sounding dramatic–few new people
come in, and no one ever leaves.
Your class roster doesn’t change much in 12 years (which is why the arrival of
a “new kid” is such a momentous event), and it’s not uncommon to go to prom
with the kid who barfed on you in second grade.
2. Half
the people in your class have the same last name. And at least
three-quarters of the class are cousins. In fact, the yearbook might be more
accurately titled “the family tree.”
3. The FFA
wields an impressive amount of power and popularity. Whether or not your
family actually lived anywhere near a farm, it was a smart move to join the
Future Farmers of America.
4. Eighth
grade promotion is as lavish as many college graduations. I will never forget
the time my friend Laila and I were discussing the details of our 8th grade
promotion dresses and hairstyles in front of our friend Lydia, who went to a
big school in the city. “What is 8th grade promotion?” she asked, and we were
both stunned. “It’s when you graduate from middle school and you buy an
expensive gown and get your hair done and walk down the aisle and get a
diploma,” we explained. Lydia was totally perplexed. “Who cares about 8th
grade?” she asked. People in small towns, that’s who. I got rid of my college
graduation gown, but you betcha my promotion dress is still hanging in my
closet.
5. “The
woods” is a perfectly normal location for a party. Want to get drunk and
shoot guns and make out? So does everyone else! Meet us in the forest half a
mile off the highway–take a left at the big rock.
6. Line
dancing is part of the Physical Education curriculum. Forget yoga and
archery, when it’s time for PE, you put on your crusty uniform and line up in
the gym to do the grapevine to the “Watermelon Crawl.” And trust me: when
you’re 26 and go on a road trip and find yourself in a rural dive bar with a
juke box, these skills will come in handy.
7. Getting
stuck behind a tractor is a perfectly good excuse for being tardy. Driving a tractor to
school is an even better excuse (“I tried to get here in time for the test, but
my combine tops out at 26 MPH.”)
8. The
football coach is also your history teacher and the librarian is also the lunch
lady. Teachers
at small schools have to wear many hats. Some of those hats are not necessarily
supposed to be worn simultaneously, but whatever.
9. If you
have older siblings, your reputation begins wherever theirs left off. Here’s how it works:
on the first day of class, the teacher is doing roll call and they get to your
last name and pause. They look up and say, “Any relation to (older sibling’s
name)?” you say yes, and then the teacher will either inform you that your
sibling is a perfect human specimen you can never live up to, or sigh
dramatically and mutter, “Oh good, another one.” Upperclassmen will also make
sure you inherit any of your sibling’s nicknames.
10. Senior
pranks often involve farm animals and/or manure. Both are so plentiful,
it just makes good sense to utilize them, you know?
Full article written by Winona Dimeo-Ediger
