The Way We Were (AKA: Glee)  

Anytime you can combine some vintage Barbara Streisand and this fall's best new TV show, you know you're in for something good. I am only three episodes in, but already, "Glee" is my favorite show on air. If you haven't seen it, I completely encourage you to check it out (even if it is on my station's competitor, FOX, Wednesdays at 9).

Every week after the show airs, I find myself oddly reminiscent of high school. I'm not exactly sure why. "Glee" doesn't exactly show high school in the best light. It is stereotypical, type-casting at its worst (or, in this case, its indulgent best). There's the cheerleader clique (always clad in their uniforms, regardless of the time of day or day of the week), the sex-obsessed, trash-talking jocks, and the dorky "Glee" singers. There's very little room for "overlap" in these roles, and just about everyone's goals are less than altruistic.

So in this way, "Glee"-- coincidentally, set in an Ohio high school-- couldn't be more different than my high school. During my teenage years, it wasn't the cheerleaders, but the girls' soccer team that dominated. Our football team was, well, lackluster to say the least (outside of my freshman year, I think we won all of six games). And the combined arts department-- marching band, choir, orchestra-- was so huge (probably 500 students in all), that the homecoming king and queen often came from its ranks. Our class president was a football captain, a National Honor Society member, and went on to Harvard. So my high school was definitely a place where people transcended their labels.

Where did I fall in all this? To this day, I'm not really sure. I wasn't a jock; I was on the varsity swim team (yessir, I was an All-American two straight years, thank you very much!), but swimming wasn't exactly the pinnacle of athletic popularity. I wasn't a "drama geek" (I use that term lightly, because since graduation, I have become a drama "geek"), but I was on the dance team and often performed in front of the entire school in costume. I might have been a nerd, simply because I got good grades, not because I studied. I somehow ended up with three study halls my senior year, and never, ever took work home that entire year. I'm pretty sure that if I had attended the fictional high school in "Glee", I would have been an extra simply passing by in the hall, never to speak a single line or steal a single scene. I've never been described as shy (no where close!), but in high school, I was more than happy to blend into the woodwork. I was ready to get the heck out of there. I knew there was more to life than just the cliques and social ettiquettes of high school. I knew while I could survive in high school, I could thrive in college.

But in a way, I know exactly how Rachel, the lead character in "Glee" feels. She yearns to be included, one of the chosen, golden people who attend every pep rally, travel in packs to weekend parties, and gossip in the halls on Monday mornings. Rachel knows where she fits in, where her niche is, but she strives to break through those social boundaries and be something more, somebody important.


(Me in costume for a local community theatre performance of "Guys & Dolls"-- I was three months pregnant in this photo!)

It's taken me years to understand that who I was in high school no longer defines me. I went on to college at my dream school, where I promptly dismissed whatever "jock" was still inside of me in favor of drama, performing in musicals and every dance group that came my way. I joined a sorority. I surrounded myself with unique and eclectic people who I never would have met had I stayed in the small, midwestern town where I was raised. After college, I uprooted myself again, this time as an adult, and continued my personal evolution. I still love to dance, I still love drama, and I still love meeting new, interesting people. But now, I do it with the confidence I lacked in high school. Now, each and every decision I make is motivated by what will make me happy, not by what will impress the ubiquitous them.

Living life confidentally and joyously-- now, that's real glee.