Finding a musical path through tough teen years

Paige Richmond

of the Gateway

High school is hard. I don’t mean academically, although I know that it’s difficult for plenty of kids, and sometimes it seems like it’s getting more rigorous.

Last week, I interviewed Theresa Malich, a former teacher at Henderson Bay High School, and we talked briefly about how much harder high school students have it these days.

Between a dozen extra curricular activities, sports, after-school jobs and basic studies, I get the impression that today’s high school students have higher expectations to meet than when I was in high school, especially since college admissions standards are getting tougher, too.

But the hardest part of high school, if you ask me, isn’t trying to balance the expectations and responsibilities of school work and other activities. The hardest part — and it definitely was tough for me — is trying to figure out who you are.

Every high school has its cliques, from the athletes to the yearbook staff, to the prettiest, most popular girls in school.

I was none of those.

I was an A-student in advanced classes. I was on the journalism staff, and I even gave student government a chance one year.

But I wasn’t your typical high-achiever. My studies, no matter how important to me, would never be as important as music.

I wasn’t much of a musician; I played the violin and the bass guitar, but I refused to practice. I was a great appreciator. In fact, I was treasurer of the Music Appreciation Club, a group that met once a month in a portable classroom so far on the edge of my high school campus that it may as well have been in another world.

Some students would bring in a stereo and play songs or entire CDs that they loved, and the other students would discuss and sometimes even argue about the merits of the music.

We all liked different types of music: One of my closest friends was a huge fan of classic rock, for example, while I was a punk rock devotee.

And while some students found solace in that once-a-week meeting, it was only a half-hour break from the social microcosm that was high school.

I’m not saying we were loners — we all had our groups of friends, both inside and outside of the club — but most of us were on the outer fringes of our social world.

My taste in punk music was expressed in my wardrobe, a choice that set me apart from my classmates. In my high school yearbook, there is a photograph of me at a Music Appreciation Club meeting — one of the best examples of my teenaged appearance. My hair is cut short and dyed jet black, and I’m wearing one of my proudest thrift store finds: A huge, light brown, fake fur coat, covering a black T-shirt bearing the logo of my favorite band at the time, British punk rock heroes the Clash.

It would be an understatement to say I didn’t fit in at my suburban southern California high school. I was picked on and teased — sometimes for my general aesthetic, sometimes because of my good grades.

While those comments bothered me, I managed to take solace in the friends I had and the music I loved. I knew that if the most popular girl in school hated me, it didn’t matter, because I had other people to hang out with who not only liked the same things I did but who liked me for who I was.

When I visited All-Star Guitar and Academy in Gig Harbor to interview Jake Nelson and Adam Hill, the two students profiled in Lifestyles this week, I was impressed by two things. First, that these two teenagers already knew music was one of the most important things in their lives, and second, that there were people in this community — namely, their teachers and fellow musicians at Allstar Guitar — who supported them.

I’ve never been enrolled in the Peninsula School District, so I don’t know how accepting the students at Gig Harbor’s three high schools are of each other. But I do know that if I attended high school here, I’d spend plenty of time at All-Star Guitar.

When I was there, it seemed to be as much a gathering place for music lovers as it was a guitar shop. Customers were talking about their musical tastes and skills while sharing details about their day-to-day lives.

Ultimately, I think, that’s what teenagers want in high school: To feel a sense of belonging by finding people or a place like them.

The trick is just knowing to where to look — whether it’s a portable classroom at the back of their high school campus, or a guitar shop downtown.