The infamous "Grade 13 Christmas Play"

Omg it’s almost Christmas.

At Duke of York, this was the most “fav-ou-rite time of the year” for us kids. We had candy-grams to buy and send out to our friends to help raise money for grad (yes, you get four Glen Coco); we had a festive spirit week to participate in that included Jammie Day, Silly Slippers Day, Santa Hat Day, Tacky Christmas Sweater “before it was a thing” Day, homemade gift exchanges with friends, Secret Santa shenanigans and, to close off the festivities – the Grade 13 Christmas play.

This was the most exciting holiday event for any graduate from Duke of York. It was an all-inclusive production where every single graduate had a role either writing scripts, acting, producing skits, choreographing the dance showcase, music, overall logistics, AV crew, or writing the class song. We were to entertain the entire school for an afternoon – and mostly at the faculty’s expense. Sorry Mr. Farooqui.

Grace was on student council and with drama being her jam, she was knee deep in helping write and produce the play portion of the show. As for my role, I was cast as Betty (yes, the token blonde haired girl-next-door persona, sporting her hikers and Ikeda overalls like a boss) in our Archie’s skit AND because I was a bit of a cheeky monkey that secretly cursed like a sailor, was asked to creatively collaborate with my partner-in-crime Tash, to write the class song.

Our direction was simple. Make the song absolutely – epic. It needed to have heart, humour and possibly even make Santa blush. No pressure eh?

Tash and I had a similar sense of humour so anything we wrote was hilarious – at least to us. Our only goal was not to tick the teachers off TOO much so they would pass us.

We sat up against the lockers by the auditorium and started to brainstorm.

We wanted to pick a Christmas carol that we could alter the words to and gently roast the faculty. Bold, I know. But when you’re in your last year of high school you have a sense of invincibility for some strange reason.

After going through the roster of traditional and non-traditional songs, we landed on Jingle Bells as our baseline. Tash was a really strong writer, and with my rhyming skills (I swear, Eminem or Mother Goose couldn’t hold a candle to me), we created a published sing-along that was immortalized in our graduating yearbooks’ centre spread.

I shall share that masterpiece here with you today.

To help frame our stage debut, imagine 30 or so uncomfortable and awkward teenagers that were handed a song (most likely that day) gathered on stage in a mess of hormones, belting out their unrehearsed lyrics surrounded by jingling bells and tremendous amounts of giggling – lead by Tash and I. It was fantastic!

Introducing…. the 1997 rendition of Jingle Bells – by Patricia Smith and Tash Colline

Mon-sieur Guay, Mon-sieur Guay, hope you like our play…
Please do some-thing a-bout our couch*, it be-longs in the foy-er – EH!

(*Couch reference: we had this awesome huge cottage worthy couch that was sticky and smelled funny in the upper foyer, that you only got to sit on if you were in Grade 13. The principal would take it away sometimes to remind us he was in charge and not us.)

Mr. Fa-rooqui, Mr. Fa-rooqui loo-king pre-tty slick…
Please don’t play with mer-cu-ry, it ex-plodes* pre-tty quick!

(*Explosion reference: Mr. Farooqui caused an explosion in the science lab that caused the fire department to arrive and close the school for the afternoon – hellooooo spare.)

Mc-Andrew through the halls, in her mint green stir-up pants…
Matching pouffy scarf et un grand brou-ha-ha*… HA! HA! HA! HA!

(*Brou-ha-ha reference: Mme. McAndrew said she didn’t want to hear any brou-ha-ha from the class when she taught – which was her way of saying there was to be no tomfoolery, unscripted laughter or shenanigans without her consent.)

Bells in hall-ways ring, Coldwell’s late for class…
The blue swea-ter and dockers look is really fading fast!

OOOOOOHHHHHH!

Mon-sieur Guay, Mon-sieur Guay, hope you like our play…
Please say some-thing to Ster-ling to let us eat* in the foy-er – EH!

(*Eating reference: the foyer was meant for studying, meetings of the minds, homework and whatnot – but if you wanted to eat, you had to go downstairs to the cafe to do so – we fought that nourishment while studying was imperative to our educational growth – Mr. Sterling did not agree… Grinch.)

Mrs. Crane, Mrs. Crane we for-got treat day…
Didn’t read the Great Gatsby*, in your bad books we will stay!

(*Gatsby reference: to this day I still haven’t read the book OR seen the movie – sorry Mrs. Crane.)

Tal-king in the halls, du-ring cla-a-aaaassss…
Jenson found us there, wan-ted to kick us in the a** – oh no!

Mr. Brow-ow-owning, and your wi-cked cal-culous class…
Been in for 2 years straight, and I still don’t think I’ll pass!

OH!

Mrs. O’Reilly, Mrs. O’Reilly sex ed made us blush*…
Too bad Mr. Bran-dy’s gone, he was our grade 10 crush!

(*Blush reference: Mrs. O’Reilly was very bold but innovative in our sex ed class… did you know that spermicidal foam can also be used as hand cream?)

This is the end, this is the end, the end of ow-er song,
For all you younger grades out there, Duke’s got it go-in’ on!

Yay!

Who knew this quality of writing was the jumping off point that led me to a successful career in creative writing, content development and visual storytelling? For reals. Thanks Grade 13 play, I couldn’t have gotten my start without you.

As for the lesson today kids – participate in school. Do all the silly stuff, weird stuff, fun stuff, stuff that stretches you, stuff that scares you a little, cool stuff, and new stuff you’ve never done before – why? Because you’ll grow up one day and reminisce about what it was like in your version of a simpler time. That’s what memories are made of.

Love
Patricia