The first day of school is always awful. Well, for me, at least. I'm not great at meeting people or being social or any of that. Icebreakers are the absolute worst for me. “Okay, everyone say your name, your favorite holiday, and the coolest thing you've ever done with craft paper.” “Um... Josh... uh... Lincoln's Birthday... hm... 'Do not disturb' sign for my doorknob.” The only thing you've learned about me is that I'm not great at being put on the spot. The first day of kindergarten was particularly rough for me. I had to answer all of the icebreaker questions, plus one.
“What happened to your eye?”
---
My mom was a single mom. Possibly the singlest mom. She worked in some capacity for some kind of medical something for most of my childhood. I have no idea what this place did or does or if it still exists. Maybe it never existed in the first place, and she just told me that's where she was all day so she'd have an excuse to put me in day care. Whatever works, man. The place she sent me to was called The Knowledge Barn. A bit of quick research shows that The Knowledge Barn closed down about three or so years ago, so if you were thinking of sending your kids there after reading this post, tough shit.
The Knowledge Barn was no different than any other pre-school or day care or whatever. There were mats and blocks and a playground and snack time and nap time. I could never fall asleep for nap time. It was right after noon. You gotta be shitting me, right? A 12:30 nap? Come on. Nap time was right before whatever it was they called “going outside and throwing dirt at each other” time. I usually spent both hours playing Game Boy, because I'll be Goddamned if I'm going to throw dirt at some stupid kid. I have something called “quiet dignity,” thank you very kindly.
One afternoon I was goaded into wrasslin' in the dirt with some kid. We were each supposed to represent somebody affiliated with the WWF. He picked Bret “The Hitman” Hart. I was that panda. We were punching and grappling or whatever you do, when he decided it was time to do his patented move. I was never a huge fan of the WWF, so when he told me that Mr. Hart's signature move was to throw me into the fence, I had no reason to doubt him.
He grabbed me by the arm and started to swing me around. He let me go, flying towards the chicken wire fence. My whole body slammed, spread eagle, into the fence. I tried to whirl around to get my revenge, except my face was caught. Right above my left eyebrow, a little to the left of the arch, a nail had lodged itself into my head. I'm pretty sure I fainted. I don't remember how I made it from Dirt Clod Park into the kitchen of The Knowledge Barn, but I have a permanent image of a bucket full of soapy, bloody water located right below my face. I sat there, pressing a sponge onto my head for what seemed like forever, waiting for my mom to get off of work and pick me up. The fine Knowledge Barn staff didn't call my mom, seeing as they figured she'd just get off work fifteen minutes later. True story.
My mom did the requisite yelling at the staff for not giving her an excuse to leave work early, and then yelled at me for “fucking around with that idiot kid.” It was the first time I remember my mom swearing, so that's in there forever. We made our way to Cape Cod Hospital, where I got a dozen or so stitches and my very own eyepatch. Apparently if the nail hit me anywhere but exactly where it did, I'd be dead or blind or paralyzed or something equally awful. So lucky me, right? Right.
For me, the most important thing to keep in mind when meeting a big group of scary new people is to never do anything to stand out. Certainly not right away. Make sure to not wear anything that would make you noticeable. Like, you know, an eyepatch. I eventually didn't need it anymore and went back to normal. I got to blend in and be like the rest of the two-eyed children.
---
It seemed that every few years I'd get to return to school fresh from the emergency room. Right before fifth grade, my right arm popped out of its socket, so I got to wear a sling. Seventh grade was crutches for something – I don't even remember what. My first day of high school was made notable by an operation on a smallish, likely cancerous mole behind my right ear, which forced me to make the decision between shaving my whole head that morning, or just a portion. The journey into my senior year was made all the better by new glasses.
If I were the type of person who thought that stuff meant things, I'd take a long look at this pattern. There would have to be something there, right? Yeah? No. Probably not.
Josh Grimmer lives in Hollywood with his wife and cat. He kinda sorta runs this blog, and has another one at http://mousebed.blogspot.com. Twitter him up at http://twitter.com/JoshGrimmer
Showing posts with label Back to School. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Back to School. Show all posts
Friday, October 1, 2010
Steve Strong: A Year Lay-Off
I was only 23. But I felt like an old man as I sat in that class full of guys just home from their missions. I hadn’t been in a scholastic setting since I was 18 and I had no confidence about college life in general, but specifically about this Japanese 202 class.
During the previous 5 years I had toiled in a pickle factory, served two years in Japan as a missionary, and worked for two years repairing audio visual equipment for a school system in Michigan. By most American standards, I was still considered fluent in Japanese, but all these young guys seemed so much more confident than me. They all seemed to know each other too. Their Japanese was funny, clever and I just knew that if I tried to speak in front of them, I’d make some grammatical error that would leave them in stitches.
I would never have chosen Japan as a place to serve a mission. It was chosen for me. I saw the formal notification as I opened the letter from Salt Lake City addressed to an “Elder Strong.” The letter said I would be spending the next two years of my life in Sendai, Japan. Like most boys my age, I had never heard of it. I had tried one year of foreign language in high school. I took German because the teacher was pretty, and I sort of wondered what Hitler was raving about in all those old movies. I got a D in the class and never really learned more than how to count to twelve and say a few inappropriate phrases.
Studying Japanese was very difficult for me. I used to tell myself that I could never learn a foreign language. But that darn letter said I was going to Sendai, Japan. There just was no way to get around that. So rather than get too worked up with grammar, I mostly studied vocabulary, and tried to mimic the way Japanese men spoke. I tried to use their phrases. I tried to slur my speech like they did. I tried to sound kind of tough and speak from my gut like they did.
It pretty much worked. By the later end of my two years in Japan, I could speak on the phone without someone realizing I was American. I dreamed only in Japanese. I even found myself bowing slightly when talking on the phone. My immersion seemed complete.
But sitting in that university class two years later, I found I had lost all my confidence. I had only spoken Japanese a few times since leaving Japan. The university said I could enroll in Japanese 202, and after two weeks take the CLEP test for Japanese 101, 102 and 201. If I scored 82% or better on the test I could purchase the credits for those classes and only need three more classes to have a Japanese minor. But if I scored below 82% I would get no credit and be asked to leave the Japanese 202 class.
I was a bottled up ball of tension and stress as I took that test. I think I got an 85% on it. I passed, but not with flying colors. After the test I slunk back into the 202 class and tried to keep a low profile. I took the required three extras classes to get a minor, but I never wanted to speak Japanese in front of other gaijin because I felt so intimidated.
I later found that most people feel that way. When I got to grad school and enrolled in the MBA program, the school required fluency in a foreign language as part of the international program. I tested for them, and they said I could only take one class at their school (Business Japanese) because it wouldn’t be fair to the other students. I took that as a complement, and spoke up like crazy in the business Japanese class because I was the best there. But because I never spoke English with the Japanese instructor the other students hated me. Quite a switch from my undergraduate program!
As I reflected back on my feelings in the Japanese 202 class, I thought about what it must have been like for my mother when she went back to college as a single mother of five when she was 40 years old.
My mother graduated Valedictorian of her high school class in 1949. She had a complete scholarship to both the University of Michigan and Michigan State University. You can imagine how excited she was to start school. And then you may imagine how distraught she was when shortly after the start of classes she discovered she was two months pregnant.
She immediately dropped out of school, forfeited her scholarship and married the father of her child. That was 1949, and that’s how things were handled back then. She became a stay-at-home-mom like most others in the fifties.
Seventeen years later she found she was a newly divorced mother of five with no child support and a household to feed. She found a job as insurance underwriter by day and started attending the local community college at night. She supported the family this way for four years until she was able to transfer to Kalamazoo College when she turned 40 years old.
Because of her JC transfer credits, she was able to enter Kalamazoo College as a Junior. After one semester there she somehow convinced Western Michigan University to accept her into the English Master’s Program (even though she hadn’t completed her BA). By doubling up both programs at the same time, she was able to graduate from both programs simultaneously.
As kids, we were sort of aware that we were poor while mom was going back to college. We had free lunches at school, and we shopped with food stamps. For one birthday my mom gave me 8 books of S&H Greenstamps that I carried to the outlet and got myself a Pancho Gonzales tennis racket (which I still have today). My kids saw a picture of me from that time and they thought I was wearing Capri pants. I told them back then we wore pants until they wore out – regardless of how they fit.
But that’s how my mom juggled all the parts of her life. We had birthdays. We had Christmas presents. We had Easter baskets. We had a hot cooked dinner every night. Not once did she neglect any of us kids or make us think we weren’t her top priority.
And there she sat each day in class. She was a 40 year old mother of five, in classrooms full of teenagers and twenty-somethings. How awkward it must have been for her after her 21 year absence from academia to return to the classroom.
When compared to my mom, my troubles seem to diminish in importance. She is a living example of how resilient we can be. She taught us kids through her example to be thankful for the things we had. She taught us to work hard. She taught us to set goals and not settle or make excuses for failures. She never paid a dime for any of her children to go to college. No tuition. No books. No living expenses when we left home. And yet, of her five children there’s an Associate Degree, four Bachelor Degrees and three Masters Degrees.
And I love her.
During the previous 5 years I had toiled in a pickle factory, served two years in Japan as a missionary, and worked for two years repairing audio visual equipment for a school system in Michigan. By most American standards, I was still considered fluent in Japanese, but all these young guys seemed so much more confident than me. They all seemed to know each other too. Their Japanese was funny, clever and I just knew that if I tried to speak in front of them, I’d make some grammatical error that would leave them in stitches.
I would never have chosen Japan as a place to serve a mission. It was chosen for me. I saw the formal notification as I opened the letter from Salt Lake City addressed to an “Elder Strong.” The letter said I would be spending the next two years of my life in Sendai, Japan. Like most boys my age, I had never heard of it. I had tried one year of foreign language in high school. I took German because the teacher was pretty, and I sort of wondered what Hitler was raving about in all those old movies. I got a D in the class and never really learned more than how to count to twelve and say a few inappropriate phrases.
Studying Japanese was very difficult for me. I used to tell myself that I could never learn a foreign language. But that darn letter said I was going to Sendai, Japan. There just was no way to get around that. So rather than get too worked up with grammar, I mostly studied vocabulary, and tried to mimic the way Japanese men spoke. I tried to use their phrases. I tried to slur my speech like they did. I tried to sound kind of tough and speak from my gut like they did.
It pretty much worked. By the later end of my two years in Japan, I could speak on the phone without someone realizing I was American. I dreamed only in Japanese. I even found myself bowing slightly when talking on the phone. My immersion seemed complete.
But sitting in that university class two years later, I found I had lost all my confidence. I had only spoken Japanese a few times since leaving Japan. The university said I could enroll in Japanese 202, and after two weeks take the CLEP test for Japanese 101, 102 and 201. If I scored 82% or better on the test I could purchase the credits for those classes and only need three more classes to have a Japanese minor. But if I scored below 82% I would get no credit and be asked to leave the Japanese 202 class.
I was a bottled up ball of tension and stress as I took that test. I think I got an 85% on it. I passed, but not with flying colors. After the test I slunk back into the 202 class and tried to keep a low profile. I took the required three extras classes to get a minor, but I never wanted to speak Japanese in front of other gaijin because I felt so intimidated.
I later found that most people feel that way. When I got to grad school and enrolled in the MBA program, the school required fluency in a foreign language as part of the international program. I tested for them, and they said I could only take one class at their school (Business Japanese) because it wouldn’t be fair to the other students. I took that as a complement, and spoke up like crazy in the business Japanese class because I was the best there. But because I never spoke English with the Japanese instructor the other students hated me. Quite a switch from my undergraduate program!
As I reflected back on my feelings in the Japanese 202 class, I thought about what it must have been like for my mother when she went back to college as a single mother of five when she was 40 years old.
My mother graduated Valedictorian of her high school class in 1949. She had a complete scholarship to both the University of Michigan and Michigan State University. You can imagine how excited she was to start school. And then you may imagine how distraught she was when shortly after the start of classes she discovered she was two months pregnant.
She immediately dropped out of school, forfeited her scholarship and married the father of her child. That was 1949, and that’s how things were handled back then. She became a stay-at-home-mom like most others in the fifties.
Seventeen years later she found she was a newly divorced mother of five with no child support and a household to feed. She found a job as insurance underwriter by day and started attending the local community college at night. She supported the family this way for four years until she was able to transfer to Kalamazoo College when she turned 40 years old.
Because of her JC transfer credits, she was able to enter Kalamazoo College as a Junior. After one semester there she somehow convinced Western Michigan University to accept her into the English Master’s Program (even though she hadn’t completed her BA). By doubling up both programs at the same time, she was able to graduate from both programs simultaneously.
As kids, we were sort of aware that we were poor while mom was going back to college. We had free lunches at school, and we shopped with food stamps. For one birthday my mom gave me 8 books of S&H Greenstamps that I carried to the outlet and got myself a Pancho Gonzales tennis racket (which I still have today). My kids saw a picture of me from that time and they thought I was wearing Capri pants. I told them back then we wore pants until they wore out – regardless of how they fit.
But that’s how my mom juggled all the parts of her life. We had birthdays. We had Christmas presents. We had Easter baskets. We had a hot cooked dinner every night. Not once did she neglect any of us kids or make us think we weren’t her top priority.
And there she sat each day in class. She was a 40 year old mother of five, in classrooms full of teenagers and twenty-somethings. How awkward it must have been for her after her 21 year absence from academia to return to the classroom.
When compared to my mom, my troubles seem to diminish in importance. She is a living example of how resilient we can be. She taught us kids through her example to be thankful for the things we had. She taught us to work hard. She taught us to set goals and not settle or make excuses for failures. She never paid a dime for any of her children to go to college. No tuition. No books. No living expenses when we left home. And yet, of her five children there’s an Associate Degree, four Bachelor Degrees and three Masters Degrees.
And I love her.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Meg Wood -- Bus Etiquette: A Primer on Picking
It’s back-to-school time here at the college campus where I work, and with each year comes a new horde of students boarding my bus every morning, fresh-faced and ready for class (at least until the second week, anyway, when they start to look bored and ready for Friday). Some of these students catch onto bus etiquette fairly quickly. Others, however, seem to require a bit more guidance.
Take, for example, the guy sitting catty-corner to me on the bus this morning. Who was, of all things, picking his nose. Not just a subtle scratch ("I wasn't going to pick my nose, I was going to thump him!" -- name that movie) or a casual quick dig for a boog that was driving him bananas. This guy spent a good ten minutes rooting around in each nostril, elbows-deep, like his fingers were French sows that knew that somewhere, deep in those crevasses, there were truffles to be had.
He'd grope around in there for a second or five, then drop his hand to his knee and casually rub his fingers together to drop the detritus onto the bus floor. From the way he did this latter move, I could tell he was actually attempting to be subtle about it -- at least he wasn't flicking the stuff clear across the aisle or, worse yet, tucking it behind his ear for later. But what I found particularly amusing about the whole thing was that, out of the corner of my eye, I could see he was closing his eyes every time he brought his hand up for the pick. This is something I call "The Bugblatter Beast of Traal" mentality, wherein you think that if you can't see others, they can't see you (see Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for details on the BBoT, and don't forget to pack your towel, you hoopy frood).
My cat does this too, though you may want to note here that she has a brain the size of a peanut. In her case, what she does is hide by sticking her head under the bed, leaving the rest of her body out in plain sight. Whenever I walk by and see this, I cannot resist sneaking up and tugging gently on her tail. "Whaaa...?" her shocked face will exclaim as her head whips out from under cover and whirls in my direction. "How did you find me? I was invisible!"
Now, if only there were a comparable action I could've performed on the Nose Pickah, because clearly someone needed to clue him in to the fact he wasn't being nearly as clandestine as he seemed to think he was. However, of course, he had no tail on which I could gently tug, and besides, it's considered bad form on the bus to grab at anybody's backside for any reason, ridiculously deserved or not. Also, he was actually sitting on said backside anyway. I suppose I could've leaned over and flicked him on the forehead, but, well, I didn't think of that in time, I guess.
Dear Nose Pickah: just because you can't see me watching you systematically mine your nostrils for gold does not actually mean I'm not watching you systematically mine your nostrils for gold. By the end of the ten minutes, I had run through so many emotions I was pretty much over being grossed out and had moved smoothly into a state of utter amusement. Luckily, before I could start tittering behind my sleeve (I'm so immature), a young girl, probably a high school student (though these days, all the college kids look 16 to me, which is how I know I’m officially OLD) came and sat down next to him and that made him quit. He probably thought, and rightly so, that said someone would not appreciate having boogers dropped so closely to her own knees and feet. It was a full bus on a rainy morning, after all -- not a hotbed of tolerance, patience, or joy, typically.
Anyway, if it turns out that Nose Pickah is a regular, I think I will be steering clear of him for a while. At least until the second quarter -- ostensibly, he will have learned some things by then. It's not that I think there's anything inherently bad about picking your nose -- haven't we all done this at one time or another? I don't even really have a problem with eating boogers, though it's not a delicacy I have a taste for myself. I guess it's more germophobia than anything else. Well, that and the image of one of his truffles permanently attached to the bottom of my shoe for the rest of the day. Now that's gross. No, like, really gross, now that I think about it.
Okay, so, to sum up, for all you n00bs out there:
1. Do not pick your nose on the bus;
2. Do not think that closing your eyes means I can't see you;
3. Keep your truffles to yourself;
4. Do not put anything in your nose smaller than your elbow, including your elbow;
5. Welcome to college.
Meg Wood can be even goofier than this. Check it out, IF YOU DARE: http://megwood.com and http://megwood.wordpress.com
Take, for example, the guy sitting catty-corner to me on the bus this morning. Who was, of all things, picking his nose. Not just a subtle scratch ("I wasn't going to pick my nose, I was going to thump him!" -- name that movie) or a casual quick dig for a boog that was driving him bananas. This guy spent a good ten minutes rooting around in each nostril, elbows-deep, like his fingers were French sows that knew that somewhere, deep in those crevasses, there were truffles to be had.
He'd grope around in there for a second or five, then drop his hand to his knee and casually rub his fingers together to drop the detritus onto the bus floor. From the way he did this latter move, I could tell he was actually attempting to be subtle about it -- at least he wasn't flicking the stuff clear across the aisle or, worse yet, tucking it behind his ear for later. But what I found particularly amusing about the whole thing was that, out of the corner of my eye, I could see he was closing his eyes every time he brought his hand up for the pick. This is something I call "The Bugblatter Beast of Traal" mentality, wherein you think that if you can't see others, they can't see you (see Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for details on the BBoT, and don't forget to pack your towel, you hoopy frood).
My cat does this too, though you may want to note here that she has a brain the size of a peanut. In her case, what she does is hide by sticking her head under the bed, leaving the rest of her body out in plain sight. Whenever I walk by and see this, I cannot resist sneaking up and tugging gently on her tail. "Whaaa...?" her shocked face will exclaim as her head whips out from under cover and whirls in my direction. "How did you find me? I was invisible!"
Now, if only there were a comparable action I could've performed on the Nose Pickah, because clearly someone needed to clue him in to the fact he wasn't being nearly as clandestine as he seemed to think he was. However, of course, he had no tail on which I could gently tug, and besides, it's considered bad form on the bus to grab at anybody's backside for any reason, ridiculously deserved or not. Also, he was actually sitting on said backside anyway. I suppose I could've leaned over and flicked him on the forehead, but, well, I didn't think of that in time, I guess.
Dear Nose Pickah: just because you can't see me watching you systematically mine your nostrils for gold does not actually mean I'm not watching you systematically mine your nostrils for gold. By the end of the ten minutes, I had run through so many emotions I was pretty much over being grossed out and had moved smoothly into a state of utter amusement. Luckily, before I could start tittering behind my sleeve (I'm so immature), a young girl, probably a high school student (though these days, all the college kids look 16 to me, which is how I know I’m officially OLD) came and sat down next to him and that made him quit. He probably thought, and rightly so, that said someone would not appreciate having boogers dropped so closely to her own knees and feet. It was a full bus on a rainy morning, after all -- not a hotbed of tolerance, patience, or joy, typically.
Anyway, if it turns out that Nose Pickah is a regular, I think I will be steering clear of him for a while. At least until the second quarter -- ostensibly, he will have learned some things by then. It's not that I think there's anything inherently bad about picking your nose -- haven't we all done this at one time or another? I don't even really have a problem with eating boogers, though it's not a delicacy I have a taste for myself. I guess it's more germophobia than anything else. Well, that and the image of one of his truffles permanently attached to the bottom of my shoe for the rest of the day. Now that's gross. No, like, really gross, now that I think about it.
Okay, so, to sum up, for all you n00bs out there:
1. Do not pick your nose on the bus;
2. Do not think that closing your eyes means I can't see you;
3. Keep your truffles to yourself;
4. Do not put anything in your nose smaller than your elbow, including your elbow;
5. Welcome to college.
Meg Wood can be even goofier than this. Check it out, IF YOU DARE: http://megwood.com and http://megwood.wordpress.com
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Miss Mokes -- Untitled
After work, on the way home, I ran by the liquor store, the good one, to get some sake. We don’t expect what life often provides us. We don’t know what new in-your-faceness it’s got for us. This is a fact, you might say.
Checkout line, I moved to a shorter one. I saw a man I had not seen in many years, a man who had sex with me in 1999. He’s a lot older than I am. Was then, too. I must have been 25? Hardly seems right, but I was. He was in his forties.
Ned, we’ll call him, for the sake of shortness and anonymity. Ned Smith. Mr. Smith likes poems, songs, girls, and art. He likes beer and authenticity. He’s got a daughter my age, too. I imagine he likes her, but, last I heard, she did not like him very much. Things change, though.
Ned was kind of funny, kind of sweet, kind of smart. A leader in the group. I fell in with that group just because, hey, why not. I like poems and music and art.
One evening, a bunch of us were at Ned’s apartment. Small place, very, very small. He’d been joking that evening about moving in with me and letting me support him. I suppose that’s, what? Flirting? Yeah. Flirt with the young woman, the one who is SO MUCH younger than you, by saying she should support you, pay your rent. That is what girls like.
I stayed later. The conversation seemed good, I had few friends, I was alone in the city. I wanted company. Up to that night, I’d had four lovers. Four. They were all long-term relationship types, all but one.
It got later. Ned said I could stay over and "it won’t be weird or anything." Now, I’m no linguist, but one could infer that by that he meant he would not try to have sex with me. I thought that was a-ok. I did not want that.
He unrolled his hobo roll (did I mention this was a small apartment?) and made room for me with my own blanket and pillow. I tried to get comfortable. Not too long into the quiet, Ned decided he should make things weird.
Now, some people understand the word no. Some people need to hear it a couple of times. Other people disregard it and wait until you tire of saying no, and then do what they will. Ned is the third kind. But I was young and very sleepy. It was over before it began, but I remember every moment of it. In my memory of this event, there was no kissing. No hugs, no shared experience. It was not enjoyable. It was not traumatic. It was creepy. It was gross. It was cold. I felt shame. He felt good, and punctuated his experience with "Good golly, Miss Molly."
I have friends who have been dramatically, violently raped. And one friend in particular, she calls my experience "regrettable sex." I do not know what I call it. I’ve been parsing out the nomenclature for years. And it’s confounded by the fact that, two days later, Ned called me to see when I wanted to go out again. See, he apparently thought we were dating, in love. In the meantime I had gone out, found another man and bedded him.
An ex had told me of one of his old girlfriends, a world traveler, a French Woman. She had been raped at knife-point in Asia somewhere, and in answer to that indignity, she took a man to bed and kicked him out, naked, when she was done with him. Sounded like a strong, smart, womanly thing to do.
New count: 6.
Ned was surprised, flummoxed even. I pretended to be his "friend" for a few years. You know, not being a victim and all that. Not being a statistic.
Tough, am I.
But I wonder if I’m misunderstanding the concept of not being a "victim." I wonder if contemporary, strong, worldly women all over are misunderstanding this. I wonder if we are taking that thought and stretching it, like plastic wrap, over our bodies, our faces, our eyes, our mouths.
I heard later on, in college, that a girl, a minor, had publicly accused Ned of date rape. People were outraged and said the girl was clearly trying to gain something from this. I told some of those people that Ned was not so good with the word no. Still, they were unconvinced.
We learn "no" at the beginning, when we are very small. What do we call this? What does no mean? What do we mean when we stop saying no? What do we mean when we absorb that feeling and decide we made a bad judgment call? Did we? Did I? What do I do with this? Do I just go on, and on? What if I see him again and he tries to talk to me? How do I do this?
I can avoid this store. I can avoid the queasy stomach and the nervousness, the adrenaline and nausea. I can avoid him, as much as possible. But life often disallows this.
Life will send you back to the beginning, whether you want it or no.
Checkout line, I moved to a shorter one. I saw a man I had not seen in many years, a man who had sex with me in 1999. He’s a lot older than I am. Was then, too. I must have been 25? Hardly seems right, but I was. He was in his forties.
Ned, we’ll call him, for the sake of shortness and anonymity. Ned Smith. Mr. Smith likes poems, songs, girls, and art. He likes beer and authenticity. He’s got a daughter my age, too. I imagine he likes her, but, last I heard, she did not like him very much. Things change, though.
Ned was kind of funny, kind of sweet, kind of smart. A leader in the group. I fell in with that group just because, hey, why not. I like poems and music and art.
One evening, a bunch of us were at Ned’s apartment. Small place, very, very small. He’d been joking that evening about moving in with me and letting me support him. I suppose that’s, what? Flirting? Yeah. Flirt with the young woman, the one who is SO MUCH younger than you, by saying she should support you, pay your rent. That is what girls like.
I stayed later. The conversation seemed good, I had few friends, I was alone in the city. I wanted company. Up to that night, I’d had four lovers. Four. They were all long-term relationship types, all but one.
It got later. Ned said I could stay over and "it won’t be weird or anything." Now, I’m no linguist, but one could infer that by that he meant he would not try to have sex with me. I thought that was a-ok. I did not want that.
He unrolled his hobo roll (did I mention this was a small apartment?) and made room for me with my own blanket and pillow. I tried to get comfortable. Not too long into the quiet, Ned decided he should make things weird.
Now, some people understand the word no. Some people need to hear it a couple of times. Other people disregard it and wait until you tire of saying no, and then do what they will. Ned is the third kind. But I was young and very sleepy. It was over before it began, but I remember every moment of it. In my memory of this event, there was no kissing. No hugs, no shared experience. It was not enjoyable. It was not traumatic. It was creepy. It was gross. It was cold. I felt shame. He felt good, and punctuated his experience with "Good golly, Miss Molly."
I have friends who have been dramatically, violently raped. And one friend in particular, she calls my experience "regrettable sex." I do not know what I call it. I’ve been parsing out the nomenclature for years. And it’s confounded by the fact that, two days later, Ned called me to see when I wanted to go out again. See, he apparently thought we were dating, in love. In the meantime I had gone out, found another man and bedded him.
An ex had told me of one of his old girlfriends, a world traveler, a French Woman. She had been raped at knife-point in Asia somewhere, and in answer to that indignity, she took a man to bed and kicked him out, naked, when she was done with him. Sounded like a strong, smart, womanly thing to do.
New count: 6.
Ned was surprised, flummoxed even. I pretended to be his "friend" for a few years. You know, not being a victim and all that. Not being a statistic.
Tough, am I.
But I wonder if I’m misunderstanding the concept of not being a "victim." I wonder if contemporary, strong, worldly women all over are misunderstanding this. I wonder if we are taking that thought and stretching it, like plastic wrap, over our bodies, our faces, our eyes, our mouths.
I heard later on, in college, that a girl, a minor, had publicly accused Ned of date rape. People were outraged and said the girl was clearly trying to gain something from this. I told some of those people that Ned was not so good with the word no. Still, they were unconvinced.
We learn "no" at the beginning, when we are very small. What do we call this? What does no mean? What do we mean when we stop saying no? What do we mean when we absorb that feeling and decide we made a bad judgment call? Did we? Did I? What do I do with this? Do I just go on, and on? What if I see him again and he tries to talk to me? How do I do this?
I can avoid this store. I can avoid the queasy stomach and the nervousness, the adrenaline and nausea. I can avoid him, as much as possible. But life often disallows this.
Life will send you back to the beginning, whether you want it or no.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Marsi White: Complacence
Regime. Every school has one. I was once a part of one. With every new school year, school politics change like the tides. And I am not just talking about the PTA.
On September 20, 2010, Bill Gates and John Legend appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show to try to stir up some politics of their own, regarding the failures of the American school system. The intent of the show was to discuss the new Davis Guggenheim project, Waiting for Superman. The movie documents the reasons parents remove their children from public schools, the financial struggles of keeping them in private schools and the startling consequences of not. The movie also documents students who are unfairly assessed and are denied access to higher quality educational programs based on that assessment. According to Oprah, Waiting for Superman is a movie that will help transform our schools. At minimum, she means to raise awareness that schools are failing and that the system needs to change.
This is not new news. However, I may be more educated than most. My husband and I were both raised by educators, and my husband is an eighth grade science teacher. We have watched trends in education cycle repeatedly, known great teachers and bad and watched our dedicated parents engulf their lives in their jobs. My dad was a district administrator for more than 20 years and school district politics were regular dinner conversation in my house.
Oprah prefaced her show by saying that the discussion and topic were not directed at the good teachers. Even so, the dialogue that followed was one-sided and seemed to be a direct attack on the teachers’ union. In fairness, they quoted Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers. However, Ms. Weingarten was not present for the discussion regarding the flaws in the system that ensued.
My husband and I agree that offering teachers tenure after two years of teaching is an out-dated practice. My husband, an eleven-year veteran, is an excellent middle school science teacher in a middle-class neighborhood close to the U.S. border. There are 1,600 students in his school. He works countless hours and is continually commended by parents, administrators and even the special education department and counselors for his effective strategies with the school’s most challenging students. However, it took him several years to achieve a level of comfort in the classroom conducive to excelling in his craft.
One of the main points of the show was that there is no protection for the child who is placed with a teacher who is not effective. As a parent, I want that protection for my children. As a professional, however, I realize that there has to be time and space for good teachers to learn. I understand that teachers’ union policies breed complacency in some. However, I also think that some teachers are unfairly judged by standards that they cannot possibly meet, based on circumstances and lack of community and administrative support. In an era of budget cuts, if the unions cannot protect the teachers, then who can?
Interestingly enough, the same afternoon that Oprah’s show aired, my husband had a meeting with a parent and a child regarding the child’s grades. The child is failing every academic class and may not have enough credits to pass middle school. The conversation went something like this:
My husband: “Johnny is not getting his work done in class, choosing to socialize and waste time instead of stay on task.”
Mom: “Johnny, why aren’t you getting your work done in class?”
Johnny does not answer and slumps his head down to his chest in a look of defeat.
Mom: “Johnny is just lazy. How much time did you give him to complete the assignment?”
My husband: “I gave him a half-hour to complete the eight-question assignment. He only completed two questions. He chose to talk to his peers the whole time.”
Mom: “Johnny, why did you not get the assignment done? You had plenty of time. Why do you talk so much in class?”
Johnny does not answer again and slumping his head back down to his chest.
Mom: “He is just so lazy. I don’t know what to do. My husband and I both work and are too tired to help him with homework. Besides, he always tells us he has no homework and that everything is fine at school. What can we do?”
My husband: “I understand your frustration. My wife and I both work, as well. What we do is make homework time between 7-8PM. That way our kids know when it is time for school work. And if they have no school work, they can read. You could try to do something like this in your home, working every night with him between 7-8 on math and English, for example, until those subjects are caught up. Then move on to science and history, and so on.”
Mom: “No. No. We are just too busy. Johnny is too busy. That would just not work.”
My husband: “Why, is Johnny in sports or Boy Scouts?”
Mom: “No. He rides his bike around the neighborhood and plays with his friends.”
Johnny does not ever contribute to the conversation, keeping his head down, never answering, never taking responsibility for his actions, allowing his mother to make excuses for him.
Conversations as described above are commonplace, unfortunately. Yet, parent expectation of what teachers and the school need to be providing for their child seems to grow every year. What Oprah’s show failed to recognize is that complacency is a common issue in schools. Certainly, teachers cannot be accountable for the parents’ unwillingness to support their child.
Which leads me to what bothered me the most about this Oprah show: I fear that misguided parents will use the show and the movie as ammunition to blame the teachers for other parents’ lack of accountability. Parents sometimes abuse power when involved with PTA or a school committee. In my children’s school, our PTA has taken a stance on nutrition. Imagine if this same energy was directed toward academic enrichment instead?
In closing: to Oprah, I get the point of your show. Administrators should be able to fire a teacher who fails to perform, like the example of the teacher who repeatedly fell asleep in the classroom during instruction time. The conversation has to start somewhere. However, please give the average, public school teacher, not the charter school teacher, not the private school teacher, a voice. Let’s talk about complacence and how we can fix that. Let’s talk about how we can make the kids learn about accountability. Let’s talk about getting teaching aides back into the classroom and reinstating after school programs aimed at low performing students. Let’s fund some programs that offer support to the average, public school teacher and see what happens.
On September 20, 2010, Bill Gates and John Legend appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show to try to stir up some politics of their own, regarding the failures of the American school system. The intent of the show was to discuss the new Davis Guggenheim project, Waiting for Superman. The movie documents the reasons parents remove their children from public schools, the financial struggles of keeping them in private schools and the startling consequences of not. The movie also documents students who are unfairly assessed and are denied access to higher quality educational programs based on that assessment. According to Oprah, Waiting for Superman is a movie that will help transform our schools. At minimum, she means to raise awareness that schools are failing and that the system needs to change.
This is not new news. However, I may be more educated than most. My husband and I were both raised by educators, and my husband is an eighth grade science teacher. We have watched trends in education cycle repeatedly, known great teachers and bad and watched our dedicated parents engulf their lives in their jobs. My dad was a district administrator for more than 20 years and school district politics were regular dinner conversation in my house.
Oprah prefaced her show by saying that the discussion and topic were not directed at the good teachers. Even so, the dialogue that followed was one-sided and seemed to be a direct attack on the teachers’ union. In fairness, they quoted Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers. However, Ms. Weingarten was not present for the discussion regarding the flaws in the system that ensued.
My husband and I agree that offering teachers tenure after two years of teaching is an out-dated practice. My husband, an eleven-year veteran, is an excellent middle school science teacher in a middle-class neighborhood close to the U.S. border. There are 1,600 students in his school. He works countless hours and is continually commended by parents, administrators and even the special education department and counselors for his effective strategies with the school’s most challenging students. However, it took him several years to achieve a level of comfort in the classroom conducive to excelling in his craft.
One of the main points of the show was that there is no protection for the child who is placed with a teacher who is not effective. As a parent, I want that protection for my children. As a professional, however, I realize that there has to be time and space for good teachers to learn. I understand that teachers’ union policies breed complacency in some. However, I also think that some teachers are unfairly judged by standards that they cannot possibly meet, based on circumstances and lack of community and administrative support. In an era of budget cuts, if the unions cannot protect the teachers, then who can?
Interestingly enough, the same afternoon that Oprah’s show aired, my husband had a meeting with a parent and a child regarding the child’s grades. The child is failing every academic class and may not have enough credits to pass middle school. The conversation went something like this:
My husband: “Johnny is not getting his work done in class, choosing to socialize and waste time instead of stay on task.”
Mom: “Johnny, why aren’t you getting your work done in class?”
Johnny does not answer and slumps his head down to his chest in a look of defeat.
Mom: “Johnny is just lazy. How much time did you give him to complete the assignment?”
My husband: “I gave him a half-hour to complete the eight-question assignment. He only completed two questions. He chose to talk to his peers the whole time.”
Mom: “Johnny, why did you not get the assignment done? You had plenty of time. Why do you talk so much in class?”
Johnny does not answer again and slumping his head back down to his chest.
Mom: “He is just so lazy. I don’t know what to do. My husband and I both work and are too tired to help him with homework. Besides, he always tells us he has no homework and that everything is fine at school. What can we do?”
My husband: “I understand your frustration. My wife and I both work, as well. What we do is make homework time between 7-8PM. That way our kids know when it is time for school work. And if they have no school work, they can read. You could try to do something like this in your home, working every night with him between 7-8 on math and English, for example, until those subjects are caught up. Then move on to science and history, and so on.”
Mom: “No. No. We are just too busy. Johnny is too busy. That would just not work.”
My husband: “Why, is Johnny in sports or Boy Scouts?”
Mom: “No. He rides his bike around the neighborhood and plays with his friends.”
Johnny does not ever contribute to the conversation, keeping his head down, never answering, never taking responsibility for his actions, allowing his mother to make excuses for him.
Conversations as described above are commonplace, unfortunately. Yet, parent expectation of what teachers and the school need to be providing for their child seems to grow every year. What Oprah’s show failed to recognize is that complacency is a common issue in schools. Certainly, teachers cannot be accountable for the parents’ unwillingness to support their child.
Which leads me to what bothered me the most about this Oprah show: I fear that misguided parents will use the show and the movie as ammunition to blame the teachers for other parents’ lack of accountability. Parents sometimes abuse power when involved with PTA or a school committee. In my children’s school, our PTA has taken a stance on nutrition. Imagine if this same energy was directed toward academic enrichment instead?
In closing: to Oprah, I get the point of your show. Administrators should be able to fire a teacher who fails to perform, like the example of the teacher who repeatedly fell asleep in the classroom during instruction time. The conversation has to start somewhere. However, please give the average, public school teacher, not the charter school teacher, not the private school teacher, a voice. Let’s talk about complacence and how we can fix that. Let’s talk about how we can make the kids learn about accountability. Let’s talk about getting teaching aides back into the classroom and reinstating after school programs aimed at low performing students. Let’s fund some programs that offer support to the average, public school teacher and see what happens.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Emily Idzior: Back to School - A Brief History
“I still respond to the academic / year, the sound of the school bell, the hot Wednesday morn- / ing after Labor Day.” -- Lyn Hejinian, My Life
I was hooked on the first day of school, clinging to the day like a raincoat to a hook. The clean smell of Windex and hope; the thrill of new crayons, new books, and a new year. It was first grade that did me in with all of those lovely new words to spell, my obsession with ellipses, being allowed to use markers only when it rained and kept the class inside. It’s the Wednesday morning after Labor Day that’s kept me in school now for almost twenty years.
I’m twenty-four, (almost twenty-five thank you very much) and I’m still in school. I’m still chugging along, still trying to figure out how to turn my love of poetry and literature into some kind of viable career. Still buying books the first week and still looking forward to what my teachers or professors will be like. I’m twenty-four years old and I still love the first day of school with all of it’s promises of the future, the “we’ll get to that later in the semester” or the delightful projects and readings I can’t wait to delve into.
For so many years, though, the first day of school was a little different. Blue pleated jumper, blue blouse, headband, socks folded down the right amount of folds. New shoes, of course, and new supplies, a new attitude.
Here’s the honest truth: I’ve always been shy. Being shy, of course, means that not a lot of people get to know you and a lot of people get to make assumptions based on your shyness. Either you’re a brat or you’re a snob; you’re an idiot or you’re really smart. I can be all of those things (and none) but most of the time I’m just me, Average Lady. The first day of school is the day you get to try and change all that. It’s the day when all the homework is going to get done perfectly the first time and it’s the day that every one's actually excited to see the Shy Girl. “How was your summer, Shy Girl?” “Do anything fun, Shy Girl?” “Can’t wait to play together, Shy Girl.” But of course, a couple of recesses and lunches later, after trying to find where to sit in the lunch room, everyone has divided themselves back into their groups from the previous year.
Fast forward through the complete awkwardness of elementary school and junior high, I remember the first day of high school. A real second chance. Most of the kids from my small Catholic grade school were going to other high schools and the ones that were going to be there, well, I wasn’t going to let them tell anyone what a loser I was for the past eight years.
The first day for eight long years had been a time of both anxiety and excitement hoping to somehow reinvent myself into someone else, trying to leap out of the skin I was in and become the girl everyone wanted to be around. Of course, in social circles it’s almost impossible to come back from the dead of being a wierdo. It really is impossible, it turns out, to pretend you love Nicholas Sparks when actually you just don’t.
Acne and glasses were both against me on that first day of high school. My skirt was longer than most of the other skirts and I had stood five feet, zero inches for long enough that I knew I’d never get any taller. I like to think I was a little butterfly waiting to burst out of her chrysalis. But I think I was more like a rough draft, needing some editing and better worded sentences.
Sure, the first day of high school wasn’t so memorable that I actually remember everything that happened. I did the usual things like turning bright red when I found out I actually had to go to a gym class. I met a nice girl named Britney and then my best friends. But I think that most of my high school career and first days, were just a terrible replaying of Madonna’s career: trying to invent my image.
It’s more or less that I wished the first day of school would play out like a bad teen movie (for today’s generation something like Twilight, but I’m thinking more like Never Been Kissed). The first day of school I’d come in like that shy but gorgeous girl who just needs to be given a chance from the cheerleaders and really the most handsome guy at school would pick me (ME!) to be the girl he dated. And then I’d get asked to prom and I’d become Prom Queen and life would be kind of perfect but in a “look where I came from” kind of way.
That of course never happened. I remained the “girl no one wanted to date” for the next four years. I went to dances of course, but was never asked. I was set up on a blind date for homecoming. I glued together something that resembled “the high school experience” but the first day for me was always the same. Maybe this year I can show everyone else how smart I am! Maybe this year they will understand that really I am pretty funny. Maybe this year I’ll lose the acne and get perfect skin just like all the cheerleaders.
I survived the angst, the awkward first kiss(surprising, yes), the notion that it was OK to ask a boy out, the notion that being smart somehow would attract anyone under the age of 21. I survived countless conversations about being like a sister, or being the kind of girl you would marry and bring home to mom and dad not the kind of girl you’d date in high school. I survived and began college.
University was like the ultimate do over for me. No one knew me. I could drive to class unnoticed and I could make friends and reinvent my past. So the first day became nostalgic. The wounds of High School were healing, I made a name for myself and I realized that I’m stuck with the body that I have and I’m the only person who can change me. I looked back for awhile on those first days as a learning process, as a “what not to do” from now one.
Now, after earning a masters degree and working on a second one the first day of school has become a little less dramatic. Here I am, a newly married woman, and I am looking back to all those first days, all the days I wish I could be someone else, all the days I wanted to disappear or run away, all the days that I so badly wanted to go back and yell at all those people who rejected me, I look back and I wish I could time travel to one first day. The first day of first grade, I want to tell myself to remember the laughter, the smells, the important things like algebra. I want to tell myself to remember all the state capitals instead of worrying about whether or not Brian two seats over thinks I’m cute. I want to run over to myself back then and say hey, guess what, life is difficult but everyone else has the same fears and anxiety you do, so go ahead and raise your hand, you definitely know the answer.
I’m looking back, smelling my favorite smells of Fall, looking forward to the crunching leaves, the oranges, the red, the taste of powdered sugar doughnuts being washed down with apple cider, the pumpkins, the frost on the green grass as it slowly falls into Winter sleep. I’m remembering the smell of the clean classroom and the smell of bonfires and I’m remembering all those successful first days. Successful because they brought me here: me with not one but three best friends from high school; me with the husband, the house, the cat; me with the masters and the dreams; me with my own goofy sense of humor; me, here now, a woman with nothing but happiness in her life. I’m still awkward a lot of the time but somehow, I still love the smell of these first days of school. I want to send you a bouquet of newly sharpened pencils, like Tom Hanks in You’ve Got Mail. I want you to feel the excitement of what could happen. The smell of hope and renewal, a second chance to start fresh before New Year's.
I was hooked on the first day of school, clinging to the day like a raincoat to a hook. The clean smell of Windex and hope; the thrill of new crayons, new books, and a new year. It was first grade that did me in with all of those lovely new words to spell, my obsession with ellipses, being allowed to use markers only when it rained and kept the class inside. It’s the Wednesday morning after Labor Day that’s kept me in school now for almost twenty years.
I’m twenty-four, (almost twenty-five thank you very much) and I’m still in school. I’m still chugging along, still trying to figure out how to turn my love of poetry and literature into some kind of viable career. Still buying books the first week and still looking forward to what my teachers or professors will be like. I’m twenty-four years old and I still love the first day of school with all of it’s promises of the future, the “we’ll get to that later in the semester” or the delightful projects and readings I can’t wait to delve into.
For so many years, though, the first day of school was a little different. Blue pleated jumper, blue blouse, headband, socks folded down the right amount of folds. New shoes, of course, and new supplies, a new attitude.
Here’s the honest truth: I’ve always been shy. Being shy, of course, means that not a lot of people get to know you and a lot of people get to make assumptions based on your shyness. Either you’re a brat or you’re a snob; you’re an idiot or you’re really smart. I can be all of those things (and none) but most of the time I’m just me, Average Lady. The first day of school is the day you get to try and change all that. It’s the day when all the homework is going to get done perfectly the first time and it’s the day that every one's actually excited to see the Shy Girl. “How was your summer, Shy Girl?” “Do anything fun, Shy Girl?” “Can’t wait to play together, Shy Girl.” But of course, a couple of recesses and lunches later, after trying to find where to sit in the lunch room, everyone has divided themselves back into their groups from the previous year.
Fast forward through the complete awkwardness of elementary school and junior high, I remember the first day of high school. A real second chance. Most of the kids from my small Catholic grade school were going to other high schools and the ones that were going to be there, well, I wasn’t going to let them tell anyone what a loser I was for the past eight years.
The first day for eight long years had been a time of both anxiety and excitement hoping to somehow reinvent myself into someone else, trying to leap out of the skin I was in and become the girl everyone wanted to be around. Of course, in social circles it’s almost impossible to come back from the dead of being a wierdo. It really is impossible, it turns out, to pretend you love Nicholas Sparks when actually you just don’t.
Acne and glasses were both against me on that first day of high school. My skirt was longer than most of the other skirts and I had stood five feet, zero inches for long enough that I knew I’d never get any taller. I like to think I was a little butterfly waiting to burst out of her chrysalis. But I think I was more like a rough draft, needing some editing and better worded sentences.
Sure, the first day of high school wasn’t so memorable that I actually remember everything that happened. I did the usual things like turning bright red when I found out I actually had to go to a gym class. I met a nice girl named Britney and then my best friends. But I think that most of my high school career and first days, were just a terrible replaying of Madonna’s career: trying to invent my image.
It’s more or less that I wished the first day of school would play out like a bad teen movie (for today’s generation something like Twilight, but I’m thinking more like Never Been Kissed). The first day of school I’d come in like that shy but gorgeous girl who just needs to be given a chance from the cheerleaders and really the most handsome guy at school would pick me (ME!) to be the girl he dated. And then I’d get asked to prom and I’d become Prom Queen and life would be kind of perfect but in a “look where I came from” kind of way.
That of course never happened. I remained the “girl no one wanted to date” for the next four years. I went to dances of course, but was never asked. I was set up on a blind date for homecoming. I glued together something that resembled “the high school experience” but the first day for me was always the same. Maybe this year I can show everyone else how smart I am! Maybe this year they will understand that really I am pretty funny. Maybe this year I’ll lose the acne and get perfect skin just like all the cheerleaders.
I survived the angst, the awkward first kiss(surprising, yes), the notion that it was OK to ask a boy out, the notion that being smart somehow would attract anyone under the age of 21. I survived countless conversations about being like a sister, or being the kind of girl you would marry and bring home to mom and dad not the kind of girl you’d date in high school. I survived and began college.
University was like the ultimate do over for me. No one knew me. I could drive to class unnoticed and I could make friends and reinvent my past. So the first day became nostalgic. The wounds of High School were healing, I made a name for myself and I realized that I’m stuck with the body that I have and I’m the only person who can change me. I looked back for awhile on those first days as a learning process, as a “what not to do” from now one.
Now, after earning a masters degree and working on a second one the first day of school has become a little less dramatic. Here I am, a newly married woman, and I am looking back to all those first days, all the days I wish I could be someone else, all the days I wanted to disappear or run away, all the days that I so badly wanted to go back and yell at all those people who rejected me, I look back and I wish I could time travel to one first day. The first day of first grade, I want to tell myself to remember the laughter, the smells, the important things like algebra. I want to tell myself to remember all the state capitals instead of worrying about whether or not Brian two seats over thinks I’m cute. I want to run over to myself back then and say hey, guess what, life is difficult but everyone else has the same fears and anxiety you do, so go ahead and raise your hand, you definitely know the answer.
I’m looking back, smelling my favorite smells of Fall, looking forward to the crunching leaves, the oranges, the red, the taste of powdered sugar doughnuts being washed down with apple cider, the pumpkins, the frost on the green grass as it slowly falls into Winter sleep. I’m remembering the smell of the clean classroom and the smell of bonfires and I’m remembering all those successful first days. Successful because they brought me here: me with not one but three best friends from high school; me with the husband, the house, the cat; me with the masters and the dreams; me with my own goofy sense of humor; me, here now, a woman with nothing but happiness in her life. I’m still awkward a lot of the time but somehow, I still love the smell of these first days of school. I want to send you a bouquet of newly sharpened pencils, like Tom Hanks in You’ve Got Mail. I want you to feel the excitement of what could happen. The smell of hope and renewal, a second chance to start fresh before New Year's.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Sabrina Parke - Crisp
Seeing all of the people that I missed over summer was never my favorite part of going back to school. I had play dates with all of the girls that I liked from June through August. I could take or leave the September through May set. To me, the best part about going back was shopping for school supplies.
I was absolutely in love with the crisp feeling that only a trip to Staples can provide. Since I went to school with the same 55 kids from kindergarten through eighth grade, school supplies were the only fresh start that I got each year. Crayons or colored pencils? Regular pencils or mechanical? Trying to predict what would be ‘in’ that year was a challenge I relished. My biggest personal dilemma was always what folders to get. They had bright, colorful pictures and set the tone for the entire year. I needed six – one for each subject – and since I was obsessive compulsive, they had to match. Was this the year to show my affinity for the Coca Cola polar bears? Was Garfield too third grade? Usually, I kept my head down and played it safe – puppies in baskets.
As I continued through school, the crisp feeling became less intense. In high school, they stopped providing books and my parents realized the importance of buying used. The crisp feeling began to fade. In college, after the initial thrill of buying new furnishings for my dorm, each semester became a test on how far I could stretch my shoddy resources. That crisp feeling was all but a memory – until my last semester of college, when one of the 55 returned, and everything was new once again.
Wherever I went, I saw everything as if for the first time. Large shrubs. Dimly lit sections of the parking lot. Enclosed staircases. All these things that had been there for years, probably decades, had fallen below my radar. Now, there were new realizations, new discoveries to be made. Classes were missed. Meetings were skipped. The possibility of unearthing a surprise was too much.
As a child, I remember time spent gazing at myself in the full-length mirror at the end of the hallway. Before going back to school, I always hoped to see changes from the previous year. A fully formed mouth of grown-up teeth. Breasts large enough to justify a training bra. Now, my body was covered in temporary/permanent changes. So, the pair of sweatpants that I was forced to buy for a high school P.E. class were fished out from the bottom of a drawer. A college sweatshirt hid the rest of my frame. Bangs weren’t cut and soon I was barely visible. At least, I hoped I was.
I was never hungry. My jaw still hurt like hell when I ate. But, I forced myself to eat. Since I was never hungry, I was never full. I had no gauge of when to stop. If I gained weight, maybe people would assume that was the reason for the sweat pants. If I gained weight, maybe men would leave me alone.
For the first time, I looked on the men in my life with suspicion. Hours were spent deliberating who could be trusted. I could not afford to be wrong. Although few ties were permanently severed, I forced myself to create distance with any possible threats. I clung closer to the men I believed could protect me – although I would never ask them to.
I have never been a feminist. I belong to no ethnicity and am merely a bland blend of Europe. Generic jokes hardly ever apply to me, and even more seldom do they offend me. But, there was that crispness again. Now I, or at least the category of person that I now fell into, was constantly the target of jokes and thoughtless comments. They were said on TV and by friends. But, it wasn’t fair to withhold what had happened from my friends then condemn them for acting as they normally would around me. So, I laughed – laughed and hoped that no one looked too close.
Despite the fact that I’ve grown up in a city with one of the worst police forces in the country, I had always been a fan of cops. Even during my teenage years when it’s basically a requirement to have a deep-seated problem with authority – I didn’t. I really thought that if I was good, they’d be there if I ever needed them. Now, I finally get it. Rodney King. The Rampart Scandal. Hell – the Bloody Christmas of 1951. The LAPD are the worst of the worst, and their detectives are the bottom of the barrel.
My life was and continues to be run on a need-to-know basis. If a friend catches me sobbing, I’ll give them the Reader’s Digest version. If an acquaintance catches me, I’ll say my cat died. Technically, I’m not lying, but I leave out the fact that Roy died in 1997. This essay marks the end of my need-to-know policy. If you’re a friend of mine who’s hearing about this for the first time, I’ve probably tried to tell you several times – I’m sorry I didn’t.
After a year of horrible crispness, it was over. While I have not become fearless, I am just no longer struck by the newness of small dangers I confront everyday. My sweatpants have found a new purpose – I’ve joined a gym. I’m doing my best to build up my upper body strength. Thoughtless comments have stopped hurting. Sometimes I make them.
The drawback to all of this is the realization that I will never feel crisp again. There will never be a newness to any aspect of my life. I was already too old for my age – now I feel ancient. I’m too weighed down by my past to experience a fresh present. When my boyfriend and I started dating, the excitement that comes with new love quickly vanished. I knew that soon I would have to tell him about my past, so that my erratic behavior would have context. While we love each other, I wish that we had been allowed to experience the joy that comes with a fresh relationship. But, considering the realities faced by many women who fall into the same category as I – I consider myself lucky.
Oh.
If you are reading this – no, not you the reader – you, don’t worry. I won’t say your name. I won’t say your address. I won’t say where you went to school, what type of car you drive, or what profession you plan to go into. As of this moment, you are a nonentity to me. You are not worth the time or energy it would take to destroy you - to do to your life what you attempted to do to mine. You have no reason to be nervous. You said it yourself – it was consensual. Maybe it was even great. I just wish I had been conscious for it.
I was absolutely in love with the crisp feeling that only a trip to Staples can provide. Since I went to school with the same 55 kids from kindergarten through eighth grade, school supplies were the only fresh start that I got each year. Crayons or colored pencils? Regular pencils or mechanical? Trying to predict what would be ‘in’ that year was a challenge I relished. My biggest personal dilemma was always what folders to get. They had bright, colorful pictures and set the tone for the entire year. I needed six – one for each subject – and since I was obsessive compulsive, they had to match. Was this the year to show my affinity for the Coca Cola polar bears? Was Garfield too third grade? Usually, I kept my head down and played it safe – puppies in baskets.
As I continued through school, the crisp feeling became less intense. In high school, they stopped providing books and my parents realized the importance of buying used. The crisp feeling began to fade. In college, after the initial thrill of buying new furnishings for my dorm, each semester became a test on how far I could stretch my shoddy resources. That crisp feeling was all but a memory – until my last semester of college, when one of the 55 returned, and everything was new once again.
Wherever I went, I saw everything as if for the first time. Large shrubs. Dimly lit sections of the parking lot. Enclosed staircases. All these things that had been there for years, probably decades, had fallen below my radar. Now, there were new realizations, new discoveries to be made. Classes were missed. Meetings were skipped. The possibility of unearthing a surprise was too much.
As a child, I remember time spent gazing at myself in the full-length mirror at the end of the hallway. Before going back to school, I always hoped to see changes from the previous year. A fully formed mouth of grown-up teeth. Breasts large enough to justify a training bra. Now, my body was covered in temporary/permanent changes. So, the pair of sweatpants that I was forced to buy for a high school P.E. class were fished out from the bottom of a drawer. A college sweatshirt hid the rest of my frame. Bangs weren’t cut and soon I was barely visible. At least, I hoped I was.
I was never hungry. My jaw still hurt like hell when I ate. But, I forced myself to eat. Since I was never hungry, I was never full. I had no gauge of when to stop. If I gained weight, maybe people would assume that was the reason for the sweat pants. If I gained weight, maybe men would leave me alone.
For the first time, I looked on the men in my life with suspicion. Hours were spent deliberating who could be trusted. I could not afford to be wrong. Although few ties were permanently severed, I forced myself to create distance with any possible threats. I clung closer to the men I believed could protect me – although I would never ask them to.
I have never been a feminist. I belong to no ethnicity and am merely a bland blend of Europe. Generic jokes hardly ever apply to me, and even more seldom do they offend me. But, there was that crispness again. Now I, or at least the category of person that I now fell into, was constantly the target of jokes and thoughtless comments. They were said on TV and by friends. But, it wasn’t fair to withhold what had happened from my friends then condemn them for acting as they normally would around me. So, I laughed – laughed and hoped that no one looked too close.
Despite the fact that I’ve grown up in a city with one of the worst police forces in the country, I had always been a fan of cops. Even during my teenage years when it’s basically a requirement to have a deep-seated problem with authority – I didn’t. I really thought that if I was good, they’d be there if I ever needed them. Now, I finally get it. Rodney King. The Rampart Scandal. Hell – the Bloody Christmas of 1951. The LAPD are the worst of the worst, and their detectives are the bottom of the barrel.
My life was and continues to be run on a need-to-know basis. If a friend catches me sobbing, I’ll give them the Reader’s Digest version. If an acquaintance catches me, I’ll say my cat died. Technically, I’m not lying, but I leave out the fact that Roy died in 1997. This essay marks the end of my need-to-know policy. If you’re a friend of mine who’s hearing about this for the first time, I’ve probably tried to tell you several times – I’m sorry I didn’t.
After a year of horrible crispness, it was over. While I have not become fearless, I am just no longer struck by the newness of small dangers I confront everyday. My sweatpants have found a new purpose – I’ve joined a gym. I’m doing my best to build up my upper body strength. Thoughtless comments have stopped hurting. Sometimes I make them.
The drawback to all of this is the realization that I will never feel crisp again. There will never be a newness to any aspect of my life. I was already too old for my age – now I feel ancient. I’m too weighed down by my past to experience a fresh present. When my boyfriend and I started dating, the excitement that comes with new love quickly vanished. I knew that soon I would have to tell him about my past, so that my erratic behavior would have context. While we love each other, I wish that we had been allowed to experience the joy that comes with a fresh relationship. But, considering the realities faced by many women who fall into the same category as I – I consider myself lucky.
Oh.
If you are reading this – no, not you the reader – you, don’t worry. I won’t say your name. I won’t say your address. I won’t say where you went to school, what type of car you drive, or what profession you plan to go into. As of this moment, you are a nonentity to me. You are not worth the time or energy it would take to destroy you - to do to your life what you attempted to do to mine. You have no reason to be nervous. You said it yourself – it was consensual. Maybe it was even great. I just wish I had been conscious for it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)