I've seen my high school on television before, but before last night it had mostly been in commercials for our annual carnival, news stories about our annual carnival, or maybe for the rare late news highlights for the Punahou-Iolani football game. I've certainly never seen my school on tv since I moved to the mainland, much less as the lead story on Nightline.

But last night, there it was. I missed the beginning of the program, so my first exposure was a dim image of Castle Hall as my ancient tv fired up its vacuum tubes. I was a little disoriented at first; it isn't uncommon to feel like one is recognizing something when, really, it's only similar instead of familiar. But no, it really was Castle Hall, and then the gym, and then the Quad.

Since I doubt Nightline would have any interest in the Punahou Carnival (their loss), there are only two reasons for anyone to care about Punahou these days. And given where we are in the 2008 election cycle, versus where we are in the 2007 LPGA season, it was fairly obvious, even before the narrative gave it away, that in this moment ABC was interested in Barack Obama's, and not Michelle Wie's, high school.

I got a kick out of seeing my third grade teacher, Mr. Lum, who apparently was on the varsity basketball team with Barack Obama, as well as instructors Pal Eldridge and Chris McLaughlin. Knowing that they are still there as a math teacher and the basketball coach, respectively, actually makes me feel not so old, for now.

Of course, everyone was there to talk about Obama's time there, which he wrote about in his memoir. I haven't read it (though my mom has given me some highlights) and I expect it to be very well-written, touching and honest. But I couldn't help but be a little uncomfortable about how Nightline, after first presenting the more upbeat aspects of high school life, seemed to dwell a little too heavily on Obama's feelings about not belonging. I don't doubt that his book's account of his feelings then is genuine, but the way it came across on tv was that somehow being in Hawaii or at Punahou must have added to the already existing sense of dissociation. Perhaps naively, I would have guessed that, if anything, that state and that school could only have had an ameliorative effect, considering the options.

It does sound like Obama, in his own words, enjoyed growing up in Hawaii and attending Punahou. Maybe I'm always a little over protective about how we're portrayed to the other 49 states. I guess that's just the homer in me speaking.