I lived in a squarely middle class area that put lots of emphasis on sports. My high school band teacher, Mr. Barthen, really helped to cultivate an environment where us weird kids who weren’t popular, weren’t jocks, were relatively academically inclined could be ourselves and have a good time doing it.

Preach. BSB 4 life.

I, too, had the VHS. Cry was the besttttttt back then.

This. Movie. Was. Everything. I saw it for the first time in 8th grade and ugly cried from when she revealed her secret to the very end of the movie. I still love Mandy Moore, I thought Shane West was the hottest guy I’d ever seen which probably skewed my pattern of dating “bad” guys, and the soundtrack still holds…