Teenybopper

Last night I finished reading this young adult book by Jerry Spinelli called Stargirl. I started reading the book as a sort of dessert after getting through Waiting for the Barbarians, a novel by acclaimed South African author JM Coetzee that was an allegory for the cruelty of civilization as well as a tale about the human face of heroism. It was also a 150-page book that felt like it was 1,500, so the lightness of Stargirl was certainly very welcome.

The book tells the story of Stargirl, the most unique, kind-hearted, and enigmatic girl who came to Mica High. Her quirky nature makes her become the most popular kid in school, but then the entire school turns on her because of her eccentricity. This makes life difficult for Leo, the boy whose heart she steals with her smile, and the narrator of the book.

Yes, it was very teenybopper, and it was very sweet and wonderful. The ending was bittersweet, but I turned the last page of the book wishing I had a Stargirl of my own, and that if I ever did, I would be smart enough not to let go.


This weekend I saw a promo on Star Movies for an airing of the film Ten Things I Hate About You. While I never particularly loved the movie, I remember quite clearly how much my girl friends from college adored that film. There was this one incident that has been stuck to my mind.

It was the beginning of the school year, we had just moved apartments, and since there wasn't much to do, we decided to rent some videos. For some reason, the girls decided to tag along, even though we made it clear that we will be the ones choosing the videos (since it was our apartment and all, and we'll be the ones paying for videos anyway). But then we got to the video store, and they saw the video for Ten Things, and they started jumping and doing this little dance and shouting, "Ten things! Ten things! Ten things!"

We ended up renting the video.

It's funny thinking about it now. One of the girls there was Hannah, who is now married and a mother to a cute baby boy. I'm sure she's still a sucker for teenybopper stuff though.

- posted by jaemark @ 4/03/2006 09:09:00 PM