Why is it that when I think of high school stories, I can only recall the most embarrassing ones?  I will never forget being in Jr. Varsity Cheerleading with only Denise, Michelle, Laurie and I showing up for games - having to pep up the crowd and make a 4-person pyramid.  Denise, I wil let you elaborate about our pyramids.....
Maira

REMEMBER BACK IN THE WHITE TUBE............I WAS IN THE DARK,
NOT KNOWING WHAT THE FUTURE HELD......I COULDN'T SEE THAT FAR.

THEN MRS. KNEELAND PULLED ME OUT........I FINALLY SAW THE LIGHT,
A STUDENT TOOK ME IN HER HAND.............BOY! DID I TAKE FLIGHT!

I SAILED ACROSS THAT LITTLE NET...............SOMETIMES IT WAS QUITE GRAND,
ONE GIRL FORGOT TO USE THE PADDLE.....SHE KEPT SWINGING WITH HER HAND.

ALL OF THE SUDDEN IT HAPPENED - ...........THE PAIN WAS HARD TO BEAR,
SOMEONE HAD KNOCKED A FEATHER OFF....AS IF THEY DIDN'T CARE!

MY LIFE WAS TRAGICALLY OVER...................IN ONLY ONE SHORT DAY,
I SURE HOPE ALL THE OTHER BIRDIES...........DON'T END UP THIS WAY.

When I think back to my 4 years at BT, I only have good memories- ok, there's just a couple not so good ones, but for the most part- its all good.  There was Marching Band- going to the White Sox Division Championship game our freshman year to play the pregame show and getting rained out- but we got to see the Sox win!

All the Student Council stuff- decorating for all the Homecoming dances in the cafeteria and so much more.

Mr. Anderson's Vocational Construction Trades class and building all of the drama sets and cleaning up backstage afterwards and being told by Mr. Anderson to NOT turn on the TV that was backstage, so naturally we did- just in time to be among the first in the school to see the Space Shuttle explode on take off (ok a not so good memory thrown in there).

Good times with good friends at all the football games, basketball games, the Drum-a-thon fundraiser, playing drums for the Choraliers, watching the Superbowl shuffle over and over again in math class the Friday before the Bears won the Superbowl.  I could go on and on.

I hope this helped bring back some good memories for someone else.  Those were 4 good years and I can't wait to see everyone together again.

I'll never forget the first bad word I learned in Spanish. I had actually learned this when I was a small child living in a Spanish speaking neighborhood. In Spanish 4 there were only a few people in our class and we would sit up on the heaters and eat our blow pops we got from the AV room in between classes. It would just slip out occasionally. I would say CACA, and Doctora Pelaez would say "BAY-LEEN-DA, dont say that!" Of course, it would be in Spanish, and everyone would laugh. She was so funny when she would get riled up. I'll never forget her. She was the BEST teacher, and I learned SO much from her!

I remember some great times in Vocational Graphic Arts. I remember when Tim McNeal and Jim Boersma were doing knockouts in the darkroom. Knockouts are where you bend over for a length of time and get dizzy and someone else cuts off your airway and you pass out. Your supposed to have wild dreams. It was dangerous, but funny when they came out of it.

Another memory is when Jim Sylvester had some itching powder, we put it in Robert Ford's brush. He was scratching furiously. It was hilarious. We also taped his books to the desk and put a folder over it so he couldn't see that it was taped. When he went lift up his books, the whole desk went with. Good times.

I'll never forget when Jim Slawnikowski, Debbie Skimel, Lisa Petner, and I left school (when we weren't supposed to) to go to lunch at Burger King in Sauk Village. We thought we would have no problem in getting back and not getting caught. Until we were sitting down eating and noticed that a group of teachers were eating lunch there. Luckily they didn't notice and we slipped out of there and back into school without getting caught.

The best time I remember was Senior Week. The breakfast, movie, senior olympics, and  picnic. That was a fun week. Lots of memories.

I remember many stories of friendly 'torture' we committed on each other but the one that stands out the most was the one time during a football game a few of us (can't remember who was involved....or do I????) covered Jose Cantu's car from bumper to Bumper in Playboy Centerfolds.

Not only was the look Jose got on his face when he saw his car priceless, when Sheryl Weldon walked out behind him (were they dating at the time??) well...i've never seen a guy blush a deeper red in my life. 

After laughing our heads off watching Jose rip all the centerfolds off his car we followed him to Aurielo's and much to out surprise he drove all the way there with one last centerfold flapping in the wind all the way there.  Other people were honking at him and pointing and he didn't figure out why until we arrived for pizza.  Then he got mad at us all over again.  

Last day of school...  Watching a certain female who shall remain nameless change out of her jeans into sweats right at her locker (which was right next to mine)...  oh yeah....  :)

-GG

Senior Olympics spawned one of the greatest overall moments for our little group (and the senior supplement has the photo to prove it). Who can forget those Hawaiian pants and our tore up gym clothes....

 Scott (Stokes), John (Brennan), Jimmy (Osborn), Joe (Cook) and I spent an awful lot of time together and that year book photo is one that I will never forget!

 The trips through the corn to Beecher to visit some girl that one of us was dating; long nights after school in the theatre setting lights and BLASTING the schools system; crashing a party at the House of Lynwood (hey, we had to go.... bad); making the rounds from house to house to visit friends and hang out; that time I had to prove my car was quicker than John's on the 395 (man that was stupid).... what a time we had!

The reunion should be a blast! Heck it was fun after 3-1/2 years (remember that one?) 20 should be amazing!

I was a very nerdy person, and had alot of growing up to do in alot of different ways !!! Anyway I finally got the nerve to say hi to a certain cheerleader that was absolutley gorgeous.....She was very nice and said Hi back...Well I took that as my way in....I constantly tried to get noticed by her....FINALLY i went to a basketball game and sat in front of the squad as close as I could just to see her......As she was doing her thing. I occasionally wave to her so that she would notice me  !!! Well she did, I hit my buddys arm and got all excited.When the game was over I stood up and casually walked towards her thinking I was the man !!! Well 10 ft before walking up to her, A large boy(wrestling king at BTHS) walked past me and she approached him in arms hugging and kissing , my buddy said to me DUDE he was sitting behind us......Then I walked away .............DAMM Love hurts.....LOL

Ok, so get your minds out of the gutter...

Picture this... London December 1986...Very mild winter in merry old England..five teens just loving the freedom along with several of their peers from Bloom Trail while Mr. Krupa and Mr. Rapp were really where?  Who knew who cared? 

Three girls shared a room.  Ms. Marlo is out running an errand.  Ms Cynthia is finishing up in the washroom.  Ms Kim is hanging out.  James, Tom, and Brett come by.  All are hanging out on Ms Marlo's bed watching some show on the telly.  Suddenly THUMP!  The legs break off the bed. 

"Shit" collectively escaped the mouthes of all in the room.  Like little mice all in the room we scurried around the room only to discover there was no way to secure those little legs back onto the bed.  Oh but brilliantly a plan was devised to make use of our limited resources while quickly devouring a few more cans of pop to do so.  Suddenly we had legs!

The cans were carefully put in place, the bed appearing "not broken".  We all then carefully got on Ms Kim's bed and Ms Cynthia's bed.  While trying to practice our best poker face because you see, Ms Marlo had to think she broke her own bed.  Why was that so important who remembers...other than maybe to escape responsibility for the fact that we broke the bed..

Ms Marlo returns.  She comes in walking around the room.  Really not noticing that no one is sitting on her bed which is the closest to the telly.  Ms Marlo, then plops on her bed and again THUMP!  OOOPS!  Look at that, wonder how that happened we said...  It took Ms Marlo about two second to realize her bed was held together by four empty pop cans and scold us all...  Ms Marlo called for another bed...And the rule was no more hanging out on Ms Marlo's bed...

The Girls :Ms Marlo, Ms Cynthia, and Ms Kim.  In London, again...  One night feeling quite frisky and just cutting loose.  Us girls went roaming around the grand old hotel landing in places we clearly did not belong as evidenced by the hidden doorways and mirrored entry ways.  We came across some other "American" boys in the hotel lobby.  We talked a little, lied a lot, and laughed throughout.  They told a few lies too....and then they went on to their rooms.   We had to address this...  See one night before this night we discovered (after our room was broken into the first time) our key worked on many doors.  It was almost like a master key really... We found their rooms.... 
So armed with shaving cream cans and cameras, we broke into their rooms while they slept off a drunk...  We covered each of the three boys in lots of cream in the face, hands, and yes in their little whitie tighties too!  Nice and fluffy that cream was...  The last boy, stirred a little and smacked himself with his freshly cream loaded hand.  He awoke with a shriek snapping his roommates out of their drunken sleep.  We quickly left the room...they followed and if I remember correctly they accidentally locked themselves out of their room in their haste to run after us...  It was a priceless moment. 

The London trip was a fantastic time for us, that is aside from all the crazy mishaps...  Mr Krupa and Mr Rapp thank you for fooling our parents into believing that you two were going to monitor our every move and then not really sticking to it...  Loved the experience.

HELL YA IT WAS A FUN TIME BACK THEN, WE MADE MINIMUM WAGE AND HAD MORE MONEY THEN THAN WE DO NOW????? SENIOR OLYMPICS WERE A BLAST, AND WHO CAN FORGET WHEN WE (THE UNCONTROLABLE CREW) WERE POWDER PUFF FOOTBALL CHEERLEADERS, WHAT THE HECK WERE WE THINKING LETTING THEM TAKE PICTURES OF US IN SKIRTS???? I LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING EVERYONE, IT SHOULD BE A BLAST!!!!!

AND TO REPLY TO MARC L. WHAT CAR MIGHT YOU OF BEEN DRIVING WHEN YOU RACED JOHN B.?????? WAS IT BIG AND GREEN, IF SO I REMEMBER IT WELL, HA HA LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU MARC LAST TIME WAS THE CANADA TRIP BUT WE WONT TALK ABOUT THAT!?!?!?!
SEE YA SOON,

I have many cool memories from my HS days, and will share them as the reunion draws near, but this one really stands out for the simple fact that for once the little guys stuck it to the man! 

Roger Lange and I, both avid metalheads (although he got blessed with the hair) were sitting in some history class taught by Mr. John Sullivan.  He was lecturing about WWII and in an attempt to impress us started quoting Churchill's famous speech . . .

"We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France and on the seas and oceans; we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air. We shall defend our island whatever the cost may be; we shall fight on beaches, landing grounds, in fields, in streets and on the hills. We shall never surrender . . ." 

Usually the class just sat there, Ferris Bueller style, with drool danging from our chins, but when he began the speech, Roger and I perked up, smiled at each other, and began quoting the speech along with him.  He was horrified!  His face betrayed his thoughts: "How do these two know that?!"

Little did he know that Iron Maiden had reproduced that very speech as a prelude to the concert recorded on Live Evil.  We'd heard it so much, we knew it verbatim. 

Imagine that.  A couple of HS punks actually knowing a little something . . .

Wow. I can't believe it's been 20 years!

Ken, when I read the story about Burger King, I laughed out loud... we came so close to getting busted! What a blast we had. I hadn't thought about that in a long time. The knockouts in Voc Graphic Arts, I still remember Tim laughing as each of us passed into La La land! I remember that "dream" I had on the darkroom floor to this day.

So many memories have come flooding back to me this past few days since I received the e-mail about the reunion. Taking the Hearse to homecoming with Jenny S. was pretty wild... We never did find out how any people we could stuff into the back of it; not too many takers.

I remember ditching one day with Dan Middleton, we hung out at the mall for the morning and went to his doctors office building to get a note so the day would be excused ( it sounded good at the time) as we were walking out of the building we almost ran right into his mom walking in! We ran into the bathroom and both crunched into a stall. We were sure she saw us and we were just waiting for her to kick the stall door open. We got away with it though, and we got away with so much more!

I remember driving Chris Snodgrass' car through Candlelight Village in first gear because Aprils mom didn't want him driving as tired as he was. He took over for me as soon as we got out of the village, before I blew the engine! By the way Chris, nice truck. What happened to Sloopy?

I still can't believe that I didn't get in trouble for riding the skateboard  down the halls with a pizza all day ala 'Fast times at Ridgemont High'. Was that senior week? I don't remember why I did it now.

Among the more embarrassing moments was when Dawn O. dumped a paper bag full of shredded notes on my head between classes one day. Was anybody else around to see that?

With a 17 and a 13 year old now, I am just waiting for "what goes around comes around" to come around. I only hope that their high school experience is as great as mine was at B.T.  I really look forward to seeing all of you! I need to dig out my yearbook and pictures. I am looking forward to seeing all of you again.

If I remember right your dream was that you were in a pool of tapioca with Satan and a volcano erupting tapioca was in the background.

I remember you asking if I wanted to double with you and Jenny for homecoming in that hearse but my date (Wendy Bottando) didn't want to because she thought it was creepy and her dad had one in their front yard. Jenny had black roses and you played Depeche Mode's Black Celebration in the hearse. I recall going to The Brown Onion after homecoming and after we were done a bunch of us getting in the back of the hearse, it was packed and the total was 19. That was a lot of fun.

....that you remembered that Ken! I don't remember getting anybody to pile into the hearse! I do remember the brown onion, and I have some pictures from that night. I'll dig them out when I get a chance and post them. You even remember the tape (tape--- he he he) that we were playing! Since I have heard of the reunion I have had nothing but great memories flooding back to me about B.T. and all the friends I made! This is why they say that high school years are the best years of your life! We all had so much fun, and learned so much from each other, and with each other! Looking forward to seeing a bunch of you again!

Has certainly been one for the re-telling these past 20 years! 

Would love to see pictures if you can find em, Jim!