1985

My name is Sue and I'm 16. I'm a junior at Mountain View High School in Bend, Oregon.

This is my social year. I spend many Friday nights at Mr. G's, an under-21 dance club. I go there with my best friends Becky and Rene, in Rene's 1967 Plymouth Valiant, the Blue Buzzard. We usually park and drink screwdrivers before staggering across the highway to the club, where we smoke Camel Lights and dance to "Rock Me Amadeus" and "West End Girls." I drunkenly make out with random boys on the dance floor.

For part of the year, I have a boyfriend. He's a second-string football player and I'm a saxophonist in the marching band. He breaks up with me for being "too liberal." Months later we go to prom together, but I come home early with a "headache." No prom sex for Doug--at least not with me.

I'm in preparation for my year as an exchange student. I attend lunchtime meetings at the Greater Bend Rotary Club. I'm usually the only female there, since in 1985 women are still not allowed to be Rotarians. I get together on a regular basis with other in-bound and out-bound exchange students and make some good friends. It's on one of these trips that I meet Wade, Student Body President at Gold Beach High School. We spend months writing deep and meaningful daily letters, but I never see him again.

I don't do much homework this year, instead I paint my nails. And I always match my clothes to the color of the polish. My grades continue to be nearly flawless, except in math where my awesome test scores don't make up for lack of homework. I end up getting a "B" in math--my lowest grade in high school. I don't really care.

I steadily lose weight this year which worries my mom. I attribute it to worry about her. Her cancer is no longer in remission and has, in fact, started to spread.