Welcome to Flashback Friday!
When I was in the 8th grade, I ran for Student Council president. I was my homeroom’s representative and any 8th grader could run, so I did, against three of my friends. There is a picture in my yearbook of the entire student council, but that would have involved rummaging in my attic, and at this time of year, would put me at risk of a brown recluse bite. So I rummaged around on the computer, a much safer and less creepy activity, and found this picture from about the same time period.
My campaign slogan could have been: Vote for Me….I’ll Bend Over Backward for You! Or perhaps: Vote for Kellie….Her Hair Blends Right in with the Floor!
Well, despite whatever efforts I put into the whole thing, I lost and I spent the rest of the year just being a measly student council rep.
The past couple of weeks have been a bit of deja vu for me because Bonny Annie has been waging a campaign to become the middle school representative for her home school tutorial. It’s a little weird isn’t it that a home school tutorial would have a student government? It’s fairly large for a tutorial (about 100 students from 6th-12th grades) and has other school-ish activities and offerings like yearbooks and proms and such.
So, anyway, she wanted to run, and all of the hurt and heartbreak of my own failed campaign came flooding back into my bruised psyche. I immediately decided to live vicariously through my teen-aged daughter and win this time!
First, we busied ourselves with the poster angle. The following were Bonny Annie’s creations based on her three-pronged message of EXPERIENCE, LEADERSHIP and SERVITUDE.
And here was my idea…
Is there any wonder that I failed at a political career?
Actually that poster was a big hit at the tutorial. You can’t see it in the picture, but Annaleigh was offering a candy prize to anyone who could name the four historical, red-headed leaders. Do you know who they are? I’ll tell you at the end of this post.
Next, we offered little voting incentives…
Get it? Pick me? You know….’cause it’s a flower.
She also had to give a speech to the student body, which I didn’t get to hear. I’ve been told it was good though.
As a last straw, I offered to bake chocolate chip cookies if she was elected. In a desperate measure, I posted it to her facebook page.
After all this, Bonny Annie still didn’t think she would win. Her reasoning was that out of the four who were running, there was just one boy. She thought he’d naturally get most of the male vote, and then the three girls who were running were all friends and hung out with the same crowd and would split votes. It sounded pretty logical to me.
*Sigh…* It’s going to be just like my 8th grade election, I thought. All of that hard work and dedication. All of those promises. All of my….I mean her…hopes, dreams plans. All gone. All dashed to pieces. All the…
Except Bonny Annie won. She is now the elected middle school representative of West Harpeth Christian Tutorial.
And I won’t need therapy after all. And I have to bake six dozen cookies.
The red-headed leaders on the poster are Winston Churchill, Thomas Jefferson, Queen Elizabeth I, and Napolean.
A fellow student said to Annaleigh that they didn’t think Napolean was a very good example of a positive leader, and she retorted, “While he may have had some psychological issues, he was a brilliant military strategist.” So there you go.
