For decades, the Haldane cafeteria has been the Wild West of the school district: lawless, chaotic, and utterly devoid of upperclassmen. And yet, somehow, the same people always end up being the first to get lunch. Curious.
When the world was young, and Haldane was still emerging from its Paleolithic era, lunch was different. Simpler times, one might say. Today, alumni reflect on their experiences of food, friends, and a time before Michelle Obama.
In 2010, former First Lady Michelle Obama passed the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, a set of legal mumbo jumbo with the goal of reforming myriad issues in school cafeterias. But before that, there was Mark Patinella, Haldane class of 1993. Presently, he is one of Haldane High School’s biology teachers, and he reflected on his time as a student in the Haldane cafeteria.
A strong memory sticks out in his mind: the allure of French bread pizza. The new pizza was mind-blowing to Patinella, and it quickly became a staple in the Haldane cafeteria. It was a time of change for school lunch, very literally in his case. When he was in high school, ATMs were becoming popular among the students, as he recounted, and the arrival of the ATM in town only meant one thing: 20 dollar bills. A flurry of bills impossible to break with the dwindling reserves of singles and fives spelled disaster for the economy of the lunchroom. So, in a desperate attempt to maintain the status quo, 20s were banned from the register. A sign sat ominously at the checkout counter, “NO 20S.” But if high school students are anything, they’re clever, to a supposedly annoying degree. This ban would lead to a new issue for the staff: Coins. Patinella recounted, “The kids came in with change, all these pennies, nickels, and dimes for their five-dollar snack.” He found the whole thing quite ironic, with the cafeteria pushing healthy eating initiatives just to have a limitless soda machine right outside the cafeteria doors.
Haldane Alumni and current history teacher Michelle Cordaro (Class of 2006) also enjoyed the pizza days. Still, it’s clear she was a stronger advocate for breakfast for lunch. She remembered that she “purposefully threw out my mom’s lunch to eat lunch that day.” As a teacher, she worries about her students. When asked about her opinion of freshmen and sophomores leaving campus, she quickly blurted out, “Good riddance.” However, she quickly amended this statement with a worry about the wellbeing of the underclassmen. “9th and 10th graders can barely walk through a door, so I worry about letting them loose into society.” When she was asked to recollect any major events that took place during her time in the cafeteria, she couldn’t remember anything specific, stating that “It was usually just chaos; no fires to report, no food fights ever.”
However, one thing in particular popped up when Michelle Obama was mentioned. Although Cordaro is glad to see the school lunch reforms in place, there’s one relic of the old cafeteria that she couldn’t forget: an alluring bag of purple Doritos. She fondly remembers treating herself to a bag of Doritos every Friday, but ever since the Obama reforms of 2010, she hasn’t been able to. Although the changes to our lunches were mainly positive, it is clear their effects have been bittersweet at times.
Like the other Haldane alumni, math teacher Kristen Peparo (Class of 2003) also has fond memories of the cafeteria, like pizza days, when the line went out the door. Back then, pizza day was a choice between rectangle cheese pizza and hexagonal taco pizza. She was also a huge fan of the crushed Oreo and strawberry ice cream bars. Although she graduated nearly 21 years ago, there were still some things that stuck out to her all these years later. She remembered a certain student who used to hold their breath in the line until he passed out, for reasons unknown to this day. Other things she remembered vividly were retainers. To her, it seemed like every month a student would accidentally toss out their retainer, prompting the entire room into a frantic scavenging attempt, rooting through the trash cans. Now it seems like history has repeated itself, as Peparo’s daughter once came home telling of a student who tossed out their Invisalign. Same story, different mouthpiece.
It seems that no matter what year you graduated, the school cafeteria will always be a wild place–but maybe with a different shape of pizza.