September is a bittersweet month for students. The joy of reuniting with school friends and starting new classes with a clean slate combines with the trepidation of heavy workloads; the transition from lazy summer to busy fall happens virtually overnight. School started on Sept. 7. The first week’s schedule was short, with Bayonne High School students getting out at 1:15 p.m.
The moves
On the first day, students pick up where they left off in the sometimes baffling argot that is high-school conversation, referring to “stuff” that happened last year and wondering about the year ahead. And then there are the come-ons, sometimes successful, sometimes not, that are the heart and soul of high-school life. A freshman boy was munching on a slice of pizza from Rana’s Pizzeria, a popular student eatery across the street from the high school. He was trying to flirt with one of the girls. “I was walking in the hallway and said excuse me to this nice young lady,” he said. No response.He tried standing closer to spark more conversation. Not a good move. The freshman, it turns out, was flirting with a junior, not a recipe for success. He got the hint, finished his pizza, and left.
The parents
Robert Bremner, 28, and DeAnna Gibson, 27, live above Rana’s Pizzeria and were waiting outside the building for their daughter, Laura,to get off the bus from her first day of kindergarten at Lincoln Community School. “She’s wearing a new skirt, so she looks very pretty today,” Gibson said proudly. Like any kid, Laura was apprehensive about the first day of school. “I kept saying you’re going back to school soon. She would say ‘no I’m not, no I’m not,’” Gibson said. “And then today I woke her up and said ‘today you’re going back to school.’ She said ‘okay,’ and couldn’t wait to get on the bus. I tell her, ‘I don’t know why you don’t like it. You always come back laughing and having fun. It’s the same thing every day. You have fun.’” Her father said Laura gets in cranky moods just like other kids, but likes her teachers and friends.
DeAnna Gibson was also waiting for her brother, Jacquin Oliver, a sophomore at Bayonne High School. She said that he can be like his niece, cranky and not wanting to get up and out the door. “He’s just a teenage boy, but he got up no problem today, and he kissed his niece goodbye and then he said goodbye to us,” she said. “But normally,” chimed in Bremner, “it’s like uhhh and roll over, and then ‘no I’m not getting up.’” The parents laughed.
Laura loves the pizza from Rana’s. Gibson said, “She’s probably going to want to get pizza, but her father is way ahead.” Bremner said, “Yeah, I got some waiting upstairs for her when she gets home. She’s going to be excited.”
“That feeling of becoming a senior and working as a senior…is like being reintroduced in a whole new way. Like now you get first priority over stuff, you’re given your own [cafeteria] with a senior lounge.” – Mark Foote
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The students
Mark Foote, a senior at BHS who described himself as “everyone’s favorite old face,” said of his final year, “That feeling of becoming a senior and working as a senior…is like being reintroduced in a whole new way. Like now you get first priority over stuff, you’re given your own [cafeteria] with a senior lounge.” Foote has already toured Hofstra and NJCU as prospective college choices to study computer science. “I’m definitely interested in that,” he said. Foote wants to work hard his first semester, and take some easier ones his second. “I wouldn’t say now, but halfway throughout the year I’ll probably develop senioritis.”
Joshua Rodas is a sophomore. “The first day was a little disorienting,” he said.“Just meeting new teachers, and some of my classes were mostly full of people I didn’t know. The thing is, as I get older the first day of school feels like a continuation of the last year.” His favorite class so far is Latin II. “It’s the same teacher. I know him, and I know most of the people in that class,” Rodas said. “I feel like I belong there.”
Rory Pasquariello may be reached at roryp@hudsonreporter.com.