Do U Even Lift Bro

Vice principal for me, she had one of those candy bar posters on the wall.

JayBag

Stephen King once said that those who recall High School fondly don't really remember it that well. Have to say I agree.

Churchill (formerly TeaBear)

I get it. Go from being the bullied to at least not being bullied. you dont agree with whats happening but your going along with it for self preservation.

Legion

Four high schools in four years. My aunt was a teacher and we moved alot.

I am the captian now

Dont remember anything from High school. People were either chill or too busy doing their own thing. My life definitely started with college. I sure as hell dont envy any stories shared here. Im thankful of my uneventful (although quite boring with too few friends) high school period. Got three friends that are still my best friends after 10 years (from different classes and years., so that counts for something!

Rodrigo Ourcilleon

It was the worst of times, it was the boring time, it was the I can't wait to get out of here time. HS just plain sucked in general. No major abuse like others had to endure, but until I found something to do that I liked - HS was boring. Booooooriiiiing.

dcy665 .

And I'm amazed by people who can't remember high school. My memories go all the way back pretty solidly to first grade, with a fair amount of kindergarten still there, and even a few sketchy stray memories from even earlier.

Daryl Sawyer

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

I remember high school as an unpleasant time of life. College was wonderful, though. :)

Joseph Bonnar

There was a kid in the year before me who took "the wrong shortcut" at some point during his first week as a freshman. The largest gang in the high school attempted to beat him to a pulp. He put several of them in the hospital and at least gave the rest a lot of pain. I think he did pretty good in high school. Because of him, I didn't have to worry about physical bullies for three years. Of course, there were still social bullies.

Some Ed

This all sounds so weird. High school was heaven for me. All the bullies were left behind, everybody was there because they chose to and like 90% of the classes were interesting.I wonder if the difference is that our schools have no connection to sports etc...

It's my understanding that a lot of bullies feel being a teacher is a good job because they're surrounded by general smaller people with less mental development. This isn't to say that there aren't a lot of teachers who are good people and want to teach. Just that there are a lot of bad eggs who are there for the wrong reasons. I'm sure the low wages factor into this, too. It's harder to be a good person when you're struggling to survive.

Some Ed

Greetings to a fellow teddybear with claws!

Ted Van Roekel

I'd agree with that, I had 2000+ in my high school across the four grades, with my graduating class over 400. In a small school I might have been a weirdo loner, in a school with my size I hung out with the orchestra/choir/band kids. And since my orchestra alone had about 75 people in it, adding choir and band in meant that the "music geeks" were too big a group to single out. I was class of '01, so we got the awkward "haha i guess maybe we'll graduate if we survive Y2k" year

Sheri Spangenberg

Lord of the Flies isn't just a book. Too few teachers, even less that truly care, and too many dark corners.

Chuck Dee

Coping Mechanism?

Chuck Dee

Except that every teen has to go, even if they did nothing wrong.

I'm amazed that people remember high school. My life began in college. I only have sketchy memories before then.

John Ridley

It’s basically prison for teens

Jeph Jacques

The smaller the high school the worse it is. Mine was 3000+ for only 3 grades. The group as a whole was diverse enough there really were no loaners to pick on. It happened, but it wasn't the massively obvious problem I've seen in other schools. We were also the absolute most apathetic group ever. Class of 99. The class after us was a big deal for no reason other than the year they graduated. It made them magical somehow. Fine fuck you. We got to have a Jr High, all 9th grade coming from 2 middles schools, because the building was under construction. 4 schedules in one year. Then we get to the high school and within 6 months, construction. Fine fuck you. Columbine was my senior year. That changed everything.

Fun memories...

Bagge

Yeah, the more I read and hear about it, the more I think that it's a systemic problem. Funny, when I grew up, we looked up at the USA as a kind of ideal country. We had a LOT of our problems, but we always thought "hey, at least somewhere people live much happier lives, so maybe it is possible for us too". But then new information started pouring in, and that image of happy ideal people with no problems started to wane. Now, as a parent myself, I'm constantly worried about future that my child would endure in the school, and I know that there's no way to guarantee that it wouldn't become hell, even by moving to another country. But at least we don't have to worry about school shootings here, so that's a bonus.

Evgeniy Semyonov

to be fair, I think it is just school in general that is broken, bullies everywhere and the only ones that get punished are those that fight back, I was kicked out of school for 2 weeks for smacking down a guy that got me excluded from 3 classes as he even got teachers to bully me. Meanwhile he was treated as a hero for facing down the school psycho, at least when I got back he was so scared of me he left me alone for the rest of my school life.

Kattandra

Judging by the comments, something is deeply broken in the whole High School system.

Evgeniy Semyonov

Funnily enough, despite being autistic, 5'5", and 120 lbs, I almost never got bothered in high school. A couple years after I graduated, one of my classmates messaged me on Facebook, apparently drunk, to say that he always thought I'd be the one to snap and shoot up the school. I still don't even know how he knew me, because I interacted with almost no one outside the spec-ed classes and I don't remember him. I think everyone thought I was scary.

Milayna

Renee needs to back the fuck off. Sometimes you do what you have to to survive the hellscape that is High School. For Elliot, that meant weightlifting, wrestling and not rocking the boat when the other jocks were being bullies. You do what you have to to be accepted and survive.

drone r0m-3

BUSTED!

Joseph Bonnar

And speaking of past strips, does anyone remember the number, or date, of the strip that showed May and Marten getting it on?

What? He's a complex Human being, with fears and drives that he often can't even articulate, let alone deal with in a constructive manner? Huh. Who would have thought....

Tom wilson

yuuuuuuup. i was nice as peaches until people were mean to me or people I care about. then all bets were off.

Vianki Bruenderman

The other Elliot (El Goonish Shive) would agree.

Daryl Sawyer

Shitting on people is apparently Renee's job.

Daryl Sawyer

I had the bad habit of beating the crap out of the people who teased me.... I can still recall every detail in my elementary principal's office. That's why I started working in the kitchen!

Utaku Beta

Survival is job number one in high school. Stop shitting on him, Renee.

Am Queue

holy shit

Creepy Cat Lady

Cinnamon roll status is receding in the rear-view mirror.

Sleepy John

Past Elliot nooooooooo~~~

Jon

high school IS manual labor. so is talking about it.

Peter McDevitt

Why does the song "highschool never ends" suddenly start playing when I read this strip lol

James Cooper

Yeah. Mine did. Sadly my high school had the worst mascot name, the Savages, as in native American savages. No one in the county could find a more manly nickname than an Native American slur. Except the north part of the county. They had cardinals.

Miyaa

Nobody did well in High School. Start doing your therapy, forgive yourself, or become a monk and get away from the world as it is, else you will drive yourself mad.

z

Back when I was in college, I was known for being "big and scary looking, but as harmless as a puppy." Then one day, my roommate and his boyfriend were getting harrassed at our favorite bar, and a fight broke out. My roommate later said "You went from teddy bear to grizzly!" I don't have many friends, I protect the ones I have.

Dracon Atrox

Heroics are optional, and muscles are not an instant qualification.

SpookyPenguin

I didn't know high schools had weightlifting teams

JD

And anyone else remember the flashback strip involving Renee, Brun, and the jocks? Acquaintances of Elliot?

Michael Boettger

Well, Elliot just got his harshbrowns returned to him! Can't say he didn't deserve that, either!

Grace Kieser

Oooh! High school hi jinks coming home to roost.

Michael Boettger

Cinnamon roll never getting dusted

Devin Gates

Oh Elliot. The best part of being the biggest strongest guy in school was beating up bullies.

Ted Van Roekel

Anyone surprised by that giant slab of adorable beef blending in with the jocks to avoid getting bullied by them? Just Renee? Thought so. 😋

gatherer818

elliot :(

Tamara Macadam