The Hippie Generation and Me

On the first day of Junior High I found my home room without too much trouble: after all, mom had taken me to explore the school the week before and I still had the map and my class schedule clenched tightly in my fist.  This was my core room, the class where all announcements and paperwork and school related things would be taken care of.  This class was longer than the rest, and the teacher was supposed to be our friend and mentor, helping us new kids feel safe and at home.  It didn't happen.  I can't remember my teacher's name, but he sure was scary.  He was tall and bald and kind of gruff, not at all cushy and homey. 

My teacher assigned us seats as we came in, alphabetical order, and I found myself sitting behind the most beautiful girl I had ever seen.  She had thick, long, wavy strawberry blond hair, she wore the shortest skirt I had ever seen, and she smelled like the perfume department at Super X drugstore.  I overheard her talking one day and discovered she wore 'white shoulders' perfume.  I've hated that scent ever since.  I often overheard her talking to the boys who hung out around her desk and soon figured out that this was not a "good girl".  She liked to talk about the parties she had been to the night before, and usually she was whispering about alcohol, drugs, and making out.  To a sheltered, naive little girl like me she was a monster!

This was the 60's, and although Mesa was a conservative town the hippie generation was slowly making its way even into our world.  Dad had talked with us kids the year before about drugs; he knew what was going on because he was an assistant principle at the high school.  It scared me silly to think I would be around kids who did that kind of stuff, and I used to have nightmares about people putting LSD in my milkshake, or injecting it into the jelly filling of donuts they sold at the concession stand in our school.  Silly, I know, but it frightened me.  I suppose we worry most about things that never happen, and in all my years no one ever asked me if I wanted to do drugs, or even smoke or drink.  I didn't hang around the kids who did, so I never had to deal with that, thank goodness.  I suppose I was what everyone called "a goodie two-shoes", but it sure made my life easier.