What happens as your past and present converges when you discover your other yearbooks after eons of time?

While having dug in a deep plastic container for my senior yearbook, I also discovered more of these emotionally-triggering chronicles that capture among the best and worst experiences of our formative years. I scooped the bound heavy weights into my arms and placed them in inverse chronological order, so I could visually promenade through these teenage souvenirs.

I searched for and found Mr. Taylor’s inscription. After I took a photo and re-read his prophetic words, I was consumed with a wave of nostalgia. I started to flip through some of the pages and read the thoughtful expressions from my friends and teachers. Their heartfelt words sparked multiple feelings and made me feel positively overcome with emotion. Consequently, I decided to pause and read the inscriptions beginning from my first year of middle school (7^th grade) onward.

I began to notice that repetitive adjectives and unique phrases were used to describe me, so I chose to create a mind map, an optical exhibit of peer perspectives reflecting how I was ‘seen’. I labeled six pages in a journal to represent the six yearbooks. I wrote my first name and/or nickname in each center circle of the map. The first time I read an adjective about myself, I drew a line extended from the center circle and wrote the word inside an additional circle. I recorded each adjective only once; however, I placed a check mark by it each time it was used in a new inscription. Many adjectives floated like horizontal silos on the map while other adjectives appeared to be suspended in air as the center of a flower, surrounded by a feather effect of multiple check marks imitating as petals.

This visible exercise was bittersweet while mourning Mr. Taylor, yet feeling incredibly loved by my friends, teachers, and peers. Unpacking the feelings expressed about me in my yearbooks reminded me of one of my favorite Maya Angelou quotes: “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” I am enormously grateful that adolescent Alison made a positive impact on the feelings of others during an arch of adolescence that is often brimming with anxiety, anguish, and doubt. I loved you all, too.