The other night at dinner, also known as, "make whatever it is you people want to eat," I was being casual mom slyly investigating my 16 year old son's potential love life.
Me: "So...if you like a girl, how do you let her know? Do you write her a note, discreetly pass it to a friend in class, who sneakily slides it over to "said girl?"
My son: "Umm no. We text."
Oh right TEXTING (cue sad trombone)
Texting can get the message across, but actual paper notes make a statement.
My husband interjects-"Yeah but then you have all these notes in plastic bins that have to be hauled around and stored in our attic taking up space!"
He has a point, granted an irritating point.
Let's go back and look at how note writing evolved over time in my world.
In my day we used a pen and paper for notes. When the teacher had their back to us, we'd hurriedly pass a note to someone across the aisle, head nodding with eyes that said. "This goes to Kelley!" And on down the line of classmates it would travel.
My two fondest note memories took place in Second grade and Sixth grade.
My Second grade class at Longfellow Elementary consisted of 5 girls, yes that's it, that was a split class with about 12 First graders.
Mrs. Hough, the scariest teacher on the planet (think Wicked Witch of the West), had no time for instigators. But really this was the perfect scenario for instigating. I mean what were the 5 of us Second grade girls supposed to do while Mrs. Hough taught the First graders? Work? I think not.
One day as the First graders were learning math with Mrs. Hough, one of us wrote on a tiny piece of notebook paper, "oink" and proceeded to pass it around.
Each girl opened it, read it, smirked and passed it on. The fifth girl, Joan, opened it and burst out laughing.
"GIRLS!" scolded Mrs. Hough.
The second most memorable note passing scheme was in Mrs. Chesna's Sixth grade class. Mrs. Chesna was pretty easy going and loved to incorporate her fascination of Prince Charles and Princess Diana into our lessons. Still, we had to remain secretive when passing notes.
I got the great idea to wrap my tiny paper note around the insides of my pen, then casually roll the pen down the aisle to Joan. (Yes, same Joan).
We thought we were so sneaky-very James Bond (really more like the Pink Panther). After about 4 clunks down the hardwood aisle, Mrs. Chesna, without looking up said, "Ok I think we've had enough of the pen passing."
Hmph As devastating as that outcome was, it didn't compare to Joan's final note to me which read, "You think you're so hot with your new watch."
Near the end of middle school and all through high school, my best friend Rebecca and I would write notes to each other every night. Note writing was a way for us to decompress, to look back at our day and share the funny, mostly dumb things of our day.
For example,
"Oh my God can you believe Mr. Knobloch's pants!? Talk about S-T-R-E-T-C-H!"
And
"Oh my God someone threw a spit ball at Mr. Perchatski in Math when he was at the board and he went nuts! He yelled, "Who threw that!? You all know who did this but you sit in silence! You probably believe in the devil! You probably have impure sexual thoughts!"
What a weirdo!!!!"
Illustrated with red devils and lightning bolts.
Note writing branched out to art, experimenting with highlighters, markers, colored pencils, lip stick and even perfume. Nothing punctuates a note like a whiff of Love's Baby Soft or a nice musky Vervé.
We wrote in code (OPOP).
I gopotop anop A onop mopy Soppopanopisophop topesoptop!
This was fun about 2 times.
I started out this post stating that paper notes make a statement. One of the biggest statements I ever made using notes falls under the heading: REVENGE.
"What does that even mean?" asked my son.
Allow me to enlighten you.
At the end of my freshman year, after almost a year of dating, my jerk of a boyfriend (soon to be ex boyfriend) says, "I was hoping that we could still date, but I'd also like to date Jeannie. (That's code for "You won't put out, but Jeannie will.") What do you think?"
What did I think?
I'll tell you what I thought...
I thought it was the most rad thing to make a pile in my driveway of all the love notes he'd written me that year, light them on fire, rip up all our pictures, dump it all in a shoe box, place it outside his door, ring the door bell and walk away.
It really was like a scene in a John Hughes movie. The scene ended with a one sided phone call of my now ex-boyfriend yelling, "What the HELL!? you burned all my notes!? Our pictures!? All those memories Ruined!"
Indeed.
You can't do that with a text.
My son-"WHAT? Whoa that is awesome. You were crazy."
Hmm maybe.
