The school disco revisited

The girls are standing against one wall, covering their mouths, whispering, giggling, intimidating. They're wearing pastel-coloured ra-ra skirts and tank-tops, oh, and really bad hair-cuts.

The boys are slouching against the other wall, trying to act big, pretending to know the words to the songs, wondering if it's cool to know songs sung by girls like Kim Wilde.  We're wearing denim jeans, with white lines down the front where mum has ironed creases into them, over and over, despite you begging her not to. Oh, and really bad hair-cuts.

You've got to ask a girl to dance, otherwise you're not cool, you're out of the gang. So, do you plunge in straight away and ask the prettiest girl there, consequences be damned? Not likely! You look furtively, you check how your breath smells "ha-ing" into your hand and trying to sniff at the same time (you're not good at multi-tasking, even walking and chewing gum at the same time is a challenge), above all you try to look cool, aloof, disinterested. You succeed. You look aloof, disinterested. Maybe one of the pretty girls will come and ask you to dance? No girls speak to you.

It's getting late, all the pretty girls will have gone soon. You launch yourself at the nearest victim, mumbling. Too late. Just as you launched yourself, the captain of the football team strutted past.  She's gone, she swoons and follows him.

You don't want to look stupid, hanging there in mid-air, talking to no-one, so you turn to her not-so-pretty, swotty, uncool best mate, and mumble to her instead. She can't hear you. You thrust your face into hers so she can hear you better, but only succeed in clashing teeth and making it look like you've made a clumsy attempt at a kiss. Everyone laughs. You blush, apologise and hurriedly leave the Friday night school disco.

Monday can't come slowly enough, but it arrives, too quickly. You can't persuade your mum you're sick enough for a day off. Harassed by the thought of your mates searching you out to "take the mickey" out of you snogging "Tracey", you hide out in the safest place you can think of, where your mates will never find you. The library. But when you get there, who should you find? Tracey. What's worse, she has stuffed a piece of paper into your sweaty hand - all colourful pens and drawings of hearts and flowers, asking you to meet her after school at the front gates. Oh no!

"The school disco revisited - aka - choosing a partner for the Learning Theories Wiki Assignment" is a work of fiction. Any similarity to persons living or dead (or otherwise on the ICT course) is purely coincidental.