The halls of RFK junior high often echoed with the sounds of music. The Kennedy Chorale. The Kennedy Madrigals. And of course, the Kennedy Now-Tones. They were all part of a long-standing family of song. But, as with every family, there was a skeleton in the closet. The boys' eigth-grade glee club. The singing group from hell. Twice a week, we transformed Mr. Frace's choir-room into kind of a chamber of musical horrors. Randy Mitchell - baritone. Doug Porter - monotone. Paul Pfeiffer - no tone at all. And of course... me. Not that we didn't have heart. It's just that the thirteen-year-old-male voice isn't exactly designed for... well... for singing. We weren't the stuff tabernacle choirs are made of.
S3 E16The Glee Club
It was... cruel. Before our very eyes, Warren had transformed from lyric tenor... to... Well... a bullfrog. So the rest of us did the only thing we could. We panicked. But the die was cast. Paul sneezed, which was too much for Doug. Somebody laughed. And I dropped my music. It was kind of a chain reaction. I'd like to say we rallied, but... we didn't. It was no one's fault, really. I guess we'd just been pushed beyond our limits. We we're a bunch of eighth-grade boys. Not an ensemble of stout-hearted men.
S3 E17Night Out
Everyone knows what happens when you fall in love. You hold each other close, you kiss, and then... you live happily ever after. For Winnie Cooper and me, "happily ever after" had arrived. After years of waiting... we were ready to face the future, together. Passing notes in class... sharing Tater-tots at lunch... being a couple. It was all kinda... wonderful. Course, in eighth-grade, part of being a couple is doing what other couples do, even if it was, well, kinda stupid. And so long as we had each other, we were ready for anything. Well, almost anything.
I did want to kiss you. Just not then.
Well then when?!
I guess maybe that's when I first realized...that love was gonna be much more complicated. And much... more simple...[as they kiss] than I'd ever dreamed.
S3 E18Faith
Once upon a time, our country was founded upon... faith. Faith in all its forms. But during the late nineteen-sixties, people began looking heavenward for new answers to old questions. The bravest among us journeyed into the unknown. While the rest of us stood by with our support. Our goodwill. And of course... Our taxes.
As I looked at that blank page, I knew that whatever I wrote would be a lie - or at best, a wild guess. It didn't matter. Whatever life lay ahead of me - a life of hope, of possibility, of uncertainty - I felt sure I knew what it would take to survive. I guess what I'm saying is... for the first time, I understood that some things are bigger than death and taxes. Like family. Like faith. I could only hope Miss Stebbins would understand, too.
S3 E19The Unnatural
There's a dream that's as old as natural grass, and nickel hot dogs... and being young. It's a dream every kid shares. The one big moment. Hero time. Of course, when you're five... that dream doesn't seem out of reach. Everyone plays the game about the same. Bad. Still, for all your short-comings... you've got the one thing that matters most. Potential. Then... as springtime rolls into fall, and Little League gives way to summer jobs... somehow the dream gets left behind.
As I stepped back up to the plate... all the cares, all the worries, all the burdens I'd carried around for the past few days just disappeared. Suddenly, the outside world fell away. It was just me. And baseball. My moment had arrived. And I knew what I had to do. I'm not sure how I did it. My memory begins with the crack of the bat, and the sight of the ball rising. Maybe that's not exactly the way it happened. But that's the way it should have happened, and that's the way I like to remember it. And if dreams and memories sometimes get confused well... that's as it should be. Because every kid deserves to be a hero... every kid already is.
S3 E20Goodbye
Teachers never die. They live in your memory forever. They were there when you arrived, they were there when you left. Like fixtures. Once in a while they taught you something. But not that often. And, you never really knew them, any more than they knew you. Still, for awhile, you believed in them. And, if you were lucky, maybe there was one who believed in you.
As I took that test, I thought about a lot of things: about how I knew him, and yet I didn't. About how he treated me like a man, and how I'd acted like a child. About how I'd let him down, and now I wouldn't. The thing is, even though I could almost feel him in the room, I knew I didn't need him for the answers, or the praise. I was on my own now.
Prior to Mr. Collins' death, Kevin, in his anger towards Mr. Collins, did not take his midterm seriously. Instead, drawing funny faces on it as a form of protest
DMr. DiPerna
Kevin, may I speak to you?
Kevin glances nervously at the stack of midterns
DMr. DiPerna
These are all the midterns. All except yours, that is. It seems yours was missplaced. Your midterm is missing and you need a grade. Any suggestions?
No sir.
DMr. DiPerna
Well, Collins did.
Mr. DiPerna presents a blank test with Kevin's name at the top. Kevin Arnold is written in Mr. Collins' handwriting
DMr. DiPerna
50 minutes, Arnold. You may begin; good luck.
As I took that test, I thought about a lot of things: about how I knew him, and yet I didn’t. About how he treated me like a man, and how I’d acted like a child. About how I let him down, and now I wouldn’t. The thing is, even though I could almost feel him in the room, I knew I didn’t need him for the answers, or the praise. I was on my own now.
Kevin writes serious answers. As time passes, Mr. Diperna approaches and Kevin hands the test to him
You don't have to grade it...It's an A.
Kevin gets up and walks towards the classroom door. He hears a familiar voice.
CMr. Collins
Mr. Arnold.
Kevin Turns back towards Mr. Collin's desk and sees him sitting there. Looking proudly back at Kevin.
Good job Mr. Collins.
They share a moment and then, without saying a word, Mr. Collins looks down at his papers and continues to grade them.
Kevin watches the desk for a moment. Long enough to see it return to being empty. He pauses and walks out the room and down the hall towards the exit.
[Cut to Kevin's yearbook]
Teachers never die. They live in your memory forever. They were there when you arrived, they were there when you left. Like fixtures. Once in a while they taught you something. But not that often. And, you never really knew them, any more than they knew you. Still, for a while, you believed in them. And, if you were lucky, maybe there was one who believed in you.
YYearbook
In Memoriam, Stephen Collins 1919-1970
S3 E21Cocoa and Sympathy
And I guess there was something in the way she said it that made me understand... Mom wasn't breaking my heart... she was breaking Paul's. Without breaking it. And in that moment, I began to realize a lot of things. Maybe my mother didn't go to the concert with Paul because she thought he was special... but because he thought she was special.
The night Paul Pfeiffer gave my mom a rose... he gave me something, too. He gave me a new way of seeing her. Paul made my mother feel good. Because he didn't look at her the way we always did. We saw "Mom". And he saw "Norma Arnold". And I think she liked that, for a change. That night I found out my mother once got sent to the principal's office for smoking in the bathroom. And that she almost married someone else, until she met my dad. I learned a lot about her - about who she was... about who she'd been... about who she wanted to be. And the next morning, she was "Mom" again. Our straight-man. Only, this time - I knew better.
S3 E22Daddy's Little Girl
From the moment a father first lays eyes on his daughter... she's forever daddy's little girl. And he's forever her hero. A giver of gifts. A granter of wishes. A knight in shining armor. And in return... she gives to him that love and respect which is special between dads and their girls. Of course, for my sister and my father... that special love and respect took the form of... guerrilla warfare. But the week of my sister's birthday... they brought out the heavy artillery. During that week, Mom was sort of like the UN... trying to mediate the warring factions. And failing miserably. Me? I was kinda like... Switzerland.
That night of my sister's 18th birthday, a lot of things happened. Maybe more than she knew. Because that night, when my father let Karen go out, he let Karen go. Maybe that's how it had to be. Children leave. And parents stay behind. Still, some things are deeper than time and distance, and your father will always be your father. And he will always leave a light on for you.
These quotes come from Wikiquote's The Wonder Years pages and are available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.