While driving around town yesterday, I saw a sign at one of the local high schools. It was a message board like the ones at churches ("Worship Sunday With Us! 8:30, 10:30, 5:30 Christ Is Lord!"), or restaurants ("Now open! Chicken Bowl $4.50"), but since the new school year had just started, there wasn't much serious business to attend to. The message was simple and very positive, "' 98 was really great! ' 99 will be really fine!"

Really fine? Well, they are still in high school. And if someone is lucky enough to be graduating in the magic year of 1999, then the year might be really fine. It will be the culmination of years of, well, school. It seemed like so much more ten years ago. And our slogan wasn't even a rhyming one, it was "'89 Kicks Ass." This was written all over my yearbooks by friends and acquaintances--pretty much since junior high when we first started getting yearbooks to write our pithy pop poetry in.

Rarely was there any real thought about what 1989 would be like until my actual senior year--and then it was really important. But before then, it was much funner to be the first one to write, "Hi Matt, thanks for letting me write in your crack," along the inner spine of a nearly pristine yearbook. After the first couple of years, I didn't mind the crack joke. I think I even missed it during my senior year, when no one seemed to think the crack joke was funny anymore.

When I was in ninth grade (officially part of high school, but housed in the junior high buildings), the high school football team was trying to win five straight state championships in football. "Make it five in ' 85!" was the slogan. Football was a huge thing in our town. There was nothing else that galvanized the community like football. It was as if everyone in town magically transported to the high school football stadium on Friday nights for three hours or so.

But when I was in junior high, I didn't go to the games. Friday night was one of those nights my friends and I liked to take advantage of everyone's absence. It was our time to be a little bit naughty.

During one boring Friday night during that fateful 1985 year (I'll cut the suspense--Clovis did win its fifth straight football championship, but the next year was the worst team in decades, so no "Six in ' 86"), my friends and I were eyeing huge orange balloons that designated participating homes on a local home tour. The idea was that people could drive around and see these huge orange balloons and then find the houses they were attached to. We just wanted one of the balloons for our own.

Lucky for us, there was one right down the road from my house. It was attached to a chimney. And one Friday night we (myself and two friends) climbed up on top of that chimney and tried to get it down. Unfortunately we were not prepared--none of us had knives. The worst we could do was wrap the heavy cord around the chimney until the balloon was hovering just a few feet above the house. We were satisfied with our work (and a little bit nervous because we were up on that roof for a while), so we jumped down and settled into less mischievous activities for the night.

The next day, someone moved the balloon. It was no longer attached to the chimney of the house. Under the cover of night, we realized the balloon was attached to something in the middle of a field directly across from the home. It took us about fifteen minutes of scouring the field to find the cinderblock (hidden under knee-high weeds) the high flying balloon was attached to. Actually, one of my friends found it by running into the nearly invisible cord and falling flat on his back. A masterful stroke of luck, we thought--although we had to laugh at our friend before thinking this.

Then we had to pull the balloon down and cut the cord. We were prepared this time and the balloon was ours with little struggle. After a mad dash to the driveway behind my house, we realized the best thing about the four foot plus balloon was the amount of helium inside. We pulled the stopper and began to take turns making our voices sound really high.

The balloon was only halfway out of helium when we had to stop. All of us were exhausted and sick from breathing too much helium. The decision was made to save the rest for another day--or at least later in the night. Unfortunately we had broken the seal and the rest of the usable helium was gone by the time we tried again.

I kept the remains of the orange balloon for a long time. It became an ornament on my drum set, a stretched orange plastic mess hanging off a spare snare stand. I thought I needed that reminder of the crazy nights my friends and I spent together. But like the yearbooks from so long ago, the physical proof is not necessary. I know if I go through those books again, I'll find those guys who felt it necessary to write in my crack.

I don't need the remains of the dead balloon to remind me of those times we interpreted Indiana Jones' escapades as a reason to climb empty houses in the middle of the night, commit random acts of destruction and run wildly from the thought that someone might be after us. Because the end result wasn't the point. It was just a reason to hang out and have fun.

I'm sure there will be many kids at Del Norte High School who will believe 1999 will be really fine. And for the rest of us, maybe just the hope that sign conveys will be enough.

Matt Worley is feeling oddly nostalgic this week.