Puce is Not for Sissies: Part Two

(If you missed Puce is Not for Sissies Part One, and the explanation of what on earth this is, and why it's on Cabbages this week, click here for enlightenment and hopefully a few jolly snickers at my expense.)

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"So how do you two like school this year?" queried Uncle Ray.

I hated it. David Lipton had purposefully stepped on my G.I. Joe lunchbox and stomped it until it oozed peanut butter and jelly. My teacher looked like the Church Lady. "Fine," I said.

The phone rang so The Creep yelled, "I'll get it! It's for me!" and ran from the room. She was spared the inquisition about school. I was sure that she had asked her friend to call her when she got home, for the sole purpose of avoiding interrogation. Teenagers were lucky like that. They always had excuses to be rude.

Dad strode into our house with a grin on his face, yelling, "Honey! I'm home early and--" His eyes fell upon Lydia and Ray. The grin slid off of his face and, in an instant, a new one appeared. It was the same grin he put on when my cousin Todd bit him on the ankle. "Hello Lydia, Ray." Dad noticed Mom admiring my present. "That's an interesting color."

"It's puce," Mom informed him.

"Sure is," Dad agreed, giving me a knowing glance. In the back of his closet were a watercolor painting of a pigsty, a souvenir Indian headdress from Lydia's trip west, and a silver-beaded handmade whatchamacallit that looked like it could have been either a Christmas tree ornament, a bracelet, or a bathing suit top. All of which were gifts compliments of my aunt and uncle.

Dinner wasn't much better. There was toxic waste on my plate. It sat there, stagnant and brownish-purple-punk, staring at me. I stared back. It was eating through Mom's fine china. 

I was sure Mom would be greatly upset about that, since we never touched the good china unless our relatives came. I didn't dare take my eyes off my meal; at any moment, it might decide to crawl off of the plate, and I wanted to be prepared. 

If the toxic waste were consumed, it would surely eat through my guts. Mom plunked down three little golf balls into the blob on my plat, and The Blob encompassed and devoured the golf balls in an instant.

"Eat your brussels sprouts," said Mom. "They're good for you."

"They disappeared," I told her. "I think they're drowning."

"You eat your dinner," Mom ordered. "This is Aunt Lydia's favorite dinner! And anyway, you love beets! You love creamed tuna on toast!"

Oh, that's what that was! "I do?" I queried, keeping a watchful eye on The Blob.

"You do." Mom's eyes burned a hole through my brain. It was a form of mind control. Her will traveled directly into my thoughts and became embedded there. That same force made me pick up my fork and attempt to shovel up some of The Blob. The Blob growled at me. My love of life overcame my mother's power, and I put down my fork.

I looked over at The Creep to see how she was faring. She was staring at her dish, too, and I noted that her hand was reaching for her fourth piece of bread. "Gee, Brenda, why aren't you eating? I thought you loved creamed tuna on toast!" I said.

Attention focused on her. She glared at me. "Oh, I do! I do! It's just that I'm not feeling very well. My stomach hurts."

"Couldn't hurt too much. You've had four pieces of bread." I had temporarily evened the score.

The rest of my relatives' visit went on in much of the same manner. We opened up our belated Christmas presents. I got a pair of puce plaid knickers to go with my shirt and tie. The Creep and Mom agreed that I would wear the whole ensemble to school the next day. The Creep had her revenge. I don't want to talk about it. I also received a record album of Shaun Cassidy's Greatest Hits.

"Wow!" exclaimed my sister. "Aren't you lucky, Robby! Boy, am I jealous!" She cackled with evil glee.

To the immense delight of my father, my sister, and myself, Aunt Lydia and Uncle Ray finally went home. I also figured out what to do with that album Aunt Lydia gave me... 

Guess what The Creep got for her birthday?

Puce is Not for Sissies: Part One

I unearthed one of my high school's literary magazines from way back in 1989, and realized I had apparently been writing humor-- or at least what passed for it among my peers-- for a very, very long time. 

This story appeared in that magazine as it appears now. While it certainly presses the boundaries of the word "literary," I thought you folks might get a kick out of seeing my 17-year-old self's fledgling attempt at humor story-telling. I've broken this into two parts because it's a bit long for one post.

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"Do you remember me?" asked Aunt Lydia with a broad, toothy smile Crazy Glued to her face. "The last time I saw you, you were one month old."

"No," I mumbled. "I don't remember back that far. That was seven years ago."

A plump hand the size of a catcher's mitt reached toward me and repeatedly wrenched the side of my face. "Oh, you are just soooo cute, Robby! Where did you get those dimples?"

"I don't know," I said, but thought they were probably due to so many of my relatives tweaking my cheeks.

And then it happened. Uncle Ray posed the one question I dreaded to hear. "And what do you want to be when you grow up, li'l feller?"

"I don't know," I repeated. I knew I couldn't tell them what I really wanted to be. They'd just smile and laugh like they always did and tell me, "Looks like ya got big plans, Son." 

I was serious. I wanted to be a doctor so I could save people's lives. I want to be a cowboy so I could get to ride a horse. I wanted to be an astronaut so I could walk in space. I wanted to be a great movie star like Pee-Wee Herman and have my own Saturday morning TV show. Most of all, I wanted to be old enough so people wouldn't ask me such stupid things.

It was bad enough that my relatives had come to visit for a few days, but there was a boa constrictor wrapped around my neck. It was squeezing tighter... tighter.... tighter... and I pulled at it, attempting to pry it from my throat. That made the serpent angry, and the angrier the boa constrictor became, the less I was able to breathe. I gasped for air.

"Leave your tie on," said Mom. "You look nice, Dear."

"I don't want to look nice, Mom. Uncle Ray and Aunt Lydia are here. Can I take this off now?"

"No. Wait until your father comes home." She adjusted the boa constrictor. I gasped again. "And stop making those disgusting wheezing noises, Robby! One would think you were choking to death."

"We brought your birthday present for you, Sweetie," gushed Aunt Lydia. She rooted through an enormous shopping bag.

Birthday present? I knew what it was! My heart soared. Things were looking up. It was the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' Slimeblaster that Santa forgot to bring me for Christmas. He didn't bring it because he knew Aunt Lydia and Uncle Ray had gotten it for me. Good old Santa! I knew he wouldn't let me down!

A box! Aunt Lydia handed me a box! I could hardly wait. The ribbons, card, and paper were quickly shredded and tossed onto the floor. I mean, I shredded that giftwrap faster than Ollie North ever could have. I moved the box's lid to reveal...

"It's a lovely shirt and tie, isn't it, Robby?" asked Mom.

"Yeah," I said.

Mom turned and smiled at Aunt Lydia who was sitting on the couch, causing it to groan and beg for mercy. There was no room for Uncle Ray; he sat on a chair. "Robby looks so nice in puce, too," commented Mom as she eyed my birthday present. "And what do you say to Aunt Lydia and Uncle Ray, Robby?"

What could I say? It's ugly? I hate it? Exactly what is "puce"? "Thank you, Aunt Lydia and Uncle Ray," I said.

My 16-year-old sister slammed the front door with the usual amount of force to announce her return from high school. She entered the living room and plunked down her books. "Hi, Aunt Lydia! Hello, Uncle Ray!"

With some difficulty, my aunt rose from our sofa. It sighed the biggest sigh of relief. Aunt Lydia's body enveloped my sister in a hug. I laughed. My sister peered over Lydia's shoulder and gave me a dirty look.

"Look what Aunt Lydia gave Robby for his birthday, Brenda!" said Mom, holding up the present that was not a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' Slimeblaster.

"Oh yeah! That's a real cool outfit!" She eyed me maliciously. "Exactly what would you call that color?"

"I believe it's puce, Brenda," replied Mom.

"Awesome shade! And Robby just looks soooo good in it! Why don't you wear it to school tomorrow, Robby?" My sister was a creep.

"Good idea," agreed Mom.

"And those orange polka dots on the tie really enhance the brilliance of those fluorescent green stripes in the shirt, don't you think, Robby?" asked The Creep.

"Guess so," I said.

"I'm so glad you like it." Aunt Lydia smiled again. She smiled more than Jimmy Carter...

(TO BE CONTINUED HERE)

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Question for today: Have you ever gotten a chance to go back and read things you wrote as a kid? And how did it hold up? 

Wrath of Mom Versus Hall Pass Liberation

One was a methane molecule. And in retrospect, I now understand that it was also, technically, a bathroom joke our class would have found really funny if any of us had actually understood it.

Yes, our chemistry teacher had been creative and his bathroom pass was one of those Tinkertoy styled molecular models. CH4. One little round thingie surrounded by four other little round thingies on spokes. I remember it to this day. Which was, I suppose, my chemistry teacher's whole point.

Sending out a twenty-years-too-late High Five to him now. Woot!

Other teachers went for the Piece of Wood on a Keychain pass. Or the Piece of Cardboard Hastily Scribbled Upon pass.

Or, if I recall correctly from band, the Metal and Fur Flute Cleaner Pass-- which being a flute player myself, I know to be something no one really should want to touch for long. Thus ensuring a very quick trip to the restroom.

But then at some point-- because when you think about it, half the student body was walking around brandishing items which otherwise should have belonged in a yard sale-- there seemed to be some kind of global switch-over to the Official Pink Signed and Dated Hall Pass Slip.

And it was this that added undue complexity to my days at Edgar Allen Poe High School.

See, as I'd mentioned earlier, I was in band. And for half the year, most of our activities were not, in fact, inside the school-- but far, far out in a weedy, goose-poop-littered field to one side of the school.

There we would march in precision formation. ("Precision" here meaning "a couple of kids will be chewing gum, while some lag to talk about copying math homework, while a few more try to kick the goose poop off our shoes.")

And we rehearsed our tunes with driven dedication. ("Driven dedication" here meaning "paying attention enough so our band director wouldn't single us out and yell.")

But the bell would ring, to signal the switch of classes, and we had a few scant minutes to do this before we would be labeled "Tardy."

("Tardy" here meaning "old people came up with this term for being late and didn't really understand how we would enjoy inappropriately using the phrase.")

So I had to go from Goose Poop Central, put away my flute, grab my stuff, and head to the gymnasium at the opposite end of the school.

We were supposed to be across a certain line in the hallway by the time the second bell rang. We knew, because Mr. O'Neill would watch for it like he was timing the New York Marathon. And every day for a year I had managed to just slip over that line in time...

Except one.

"You! You're tardy! Detention!"

Well, I had never had detention in my life. There was a reason for this, too. Detention meant being detained. Which meant my mother, who would be picking me up after school, would have to wait for me. And my mother did not so much wait. I would call it more of a slow boil.

I believe I mentioned this before, I was an only child and Mom didn't exactly have what you'd call perspective in child rearing. ("Perspective" here meaning "any sort of concept that children weren't just lovely quiet plants that you could put in window, water occasionally, watch them bud into something breath-taking, and which never, ever would inconvenience you by dropping leaves on your carpeting.")

So I had done all I could do to avoid this. My own significant lack of perspective knew it would be The End of the World as We Know It.

Detention meant that not only would this go on my clean School Record, it would trigger the Wrath of Mom.

Which almost guaranteed my having to explain and apologize for the error of my ways, AND a loss of TV and/or phone privileges. This meant missing vital 21 Jump Street time.

(For my younger readers, there was no TiVo or TV series videos in the 80s. If you missed an episode, it was lost forever. Weep for us.)

Well, I spent the better part of this day in a panic. I wondered at the various punishments I would receive at home, and in what combination. I pondered whether my detention would prevent me from getting into a good college. And I worried that Detective Tom Hanson of Jump Street and I would be separated from each other for the rest of my young life.

So after school, I ran to Mr. O'Neill's office as fast as my pink high-top sneakers could take me. And there, Mr. O'Neill saw a girl who he'd never, ever seen even speak before. The one who sucked at almost every sport he trotted out, but had an unnaturally wicked volleyball serve.

And she began to speak in tongues. She said something about goose poop and running marathons... And the unreasonable expecations of academia... And logic and imaginary lines... And impending doom and tardiness...

And she concluded with a phrase rife with rage and exasperation and all of the injustices of youth, "And I've never had a detention and I'm not going to have one now."

Well, poor Mr. O'Neill. He didn't know what to say. And really, what was there to say? I had said it all.

I avoided detention that day, and every other day, as I think Mr. O'Neill was a little afraid of me after that. Plus, I eventually got ahold of the most prized items of all items in the school...

On pure accident, I ended up with an undated, un-time-stamped Official Pink Hall Pass.

And that's when I knew, nothing could stop me now.

My Life as a Junior High Heavy Metal Rockstar

"So, how's that heavy metal band going?" Fig Newton, self-appointed class clown (you can read about his ongoing War of Wills with one substitute teacher here) had turned his chair to me, Cheshire grin on his face.

I liked Fig. His jokes never ventured into that truly mean territory that some kids' tended to. But I also knew enough to sense danger ahead. Y'know, like livestock seem to know a thunderstorm is coming.

Heavy metal?! In that moment, I tried to recall my current musical work. To-date it had involved eight years of tedious piano lessons where I tried desperately to squeeze even mild Billy Joel tunes into an otherwise rigid classical repertoire...

And the rest of it was all about school band flute-tooting, where the closest we got to rocking out was Neil Diamond's "America."

We took what we could get.

"Um..." I suavely stalled for time.

"You and Josette," Fig went on to explain. "Your heavy metal band. 'Thorson and Hadley.' I hear it's getting really big."

"Ohhh!" I said, light dawning over my mental schoolyard. Now I saw where we were going with this. This was supposed to be humor. See, because my best friend since the beginning of time, Josette Hadley and I were both big ol' nerds. Quiet, and good students, and hopelessly awkward....

Josette was a nervous kid because she'd had so friggin' many CCD classes she'd gotten the idea she was treading a fine line to Hell with pretty much breathing the wrong way.

I had the unfortunate curse of being the only child of strict, distinctly-unamused perfectionists where even my most minor toe out of line was viewed as a horrifying reflection on their failure in the whole unspoken Exceptional Parent Competition they seem to have signed up for...

None of my classmates knew these specific pressures, mind you. But they could smell fear. Sort of like sharks to blood in the water. It couldn't be helped. It was Nature's Law.

So this all was supposed to be hilarious because the banging of the heads, we did not so much do.

"They have a heavy metal band," Fig confidentially told two of the boys around him. "Thorson and Hadley, it's called. They really rock."

"Um, sure," I said, flatly, "the gigs-- they just keep coming." I went back to doodling hearts and Garfields in my Trapper Keeper notebook.

And so began the rise of this new and rather eccentric running joke among my classmates. During the day, Josette and I were introverted goody-two-shoes junior high students...

During evenings and weekends, though, we were leather-clad hard core rockers who gave Joan Jett, Heart, AC/DC and Yngwie Malmsteen a run for their money.

The shift came somewhere into about the third day of this (because in school situations, what is funny one moment is, of course, well-worth repeating word-for-word a bazillion times to infinity).

So seeing that this theme could easily run clear into summer vacation and possibly follow us for the rest of our lives, being something we'd have to try to smooth over with potential employers-- ("no, I never did bite the head off a chicken") -- Josette and I got an idea.

And we went to work.

"Here," I handed Fig a slice of spiral bound notebook paper. I even had gone to the trouble to trim those little fringy things off, so he knew it was important.

"What's this?" He held it, frowning.

"Read it."

In big letters on the top of the paper was a logo. We'd toyed with this, oh, for a good hour or two. Which in kid-time is really years. Trying out different variations. Little nuances. Eventually we'd settled on writing "Thorson" in jagged 80s KISS-style lettering, and "Hadley" all in capital letters. Because, since my name was first, y'know, hers should be in caps. To show equal importance.

We were determined not to have any control and ego issues break up our band like McCartney and Lennon... David Lee Roth and Van Halen... erm, Simon and Garfunkel.

Instead of a traditional "and" we showed our rebellious heavy metal nature by using a separating lightning bolt.

Oh, it was so very cool, we were sure.

Below this masterpiece of branding, was a song list. Twelve song titles, from the first Thorson/HADLEY album.

These titles were as repulsive and violent as we could think to make them. Which, of course, wasn't very. But we gave it our all. Edgy! Raw! Involving pain and stench even, which we thought was a particularly nice touch.

Oh, we had stepped onto the stage and strummed the first grinding electric chord of a whole new age in junior high school life!

Fig passed the paper around to his buddies, the ones who had been helping perpetuate the theme. As long as it had taken me to get the initial joke, it took them to realize Josette and I had decided to embrace it.

Next in our work were the lyrics pages. Lyrics fleshing out all of those vulgar song titles. We were nerds, after all, so one thing you could certainly count on nerds to do properly-- particularly girl nerds who excelled in Language Arts-- was to write decent rhyme.

Oh, we made the songs ridiculously silly, incredibly spoofy, and shared those, too, with the masses.

Then came the promo posters. We were Artsy Nerds, yes, so promotional literature could be whipped up in no-time!

Our school book covers brandished our logo and information about our tours. We had rave reviews written up. Soon, everyone knew about Thorson/HADLEY. Our heavy metal infamy extended throughout junior high and well into high school, until it had absolutely just nowhere else to go.

We had peaked at 18, like so many child stars.

Sometimes, now as an adult, when I find myself once again being thrown into the role of responsible, reliable goody-two-shoes, I find myself longing for my headbanging past. Those days so free, so full of beautiful music with words like "reek" and "puke" in it... And of course the fame...

Oh, the fame...

But, at least these golden days of glory were immortalized. In various spots, in the 1989 Edgar Allen Poe High School Year Book, you will see it printed there-- a message for us graduating seniors to remember always:

Thorson/HADLEY RULEZZZZ!

You can take the girl out of the 80s big hair, but you never quite take the 80s big hair out of the girl.

I Was a Juvenile Cacoa Dealer

Call it the entrepreneurial nature of youth. Or desperation. Call it a laziness that meant I didn't have to drag my 13-year-old butt down gray Jersey streets for hours, alone, in the bleak autumn chill.

Call it meeting local market demand. Or easy money.

Hey, call it "Clarence," if you like.

But under this mild-mannered exterior...

Below this honors student halo and within these polished shoes of goody-two...

There lurked a flagrant rules-violator and illegal goods pack mule at the institution of learning we'll call Edgar Allen Poe High School.

And the benefits far outweighed any burden on my teenage conscience.

Yes... you guessed it... I was dealing in...

Band Candy.

"Do you have it? Do you have the stuff?"

Tanya "The Moo" Mueller was a big-boned, big-chested, big-bellied, big-fisted girl with thighs like a junkyard car crusher. She'd sooner block tackle you as look at you. I knew; a few of my friends had unwillingly played her tackle dummy.

But "The Moo" and I had found unexpected common ground. Yes, each time her great shadow would fall over me in the girl's locker room like an indoor solar eclipse, oh, I'd still flinch...

I'd still anticipate knuckles against my newly braces-free teeth. But what I'd get was a twenty tucked hastily into my hand. As long as I had those band candy chocolate bars... that sweet, sweet sugar rush... I had immunity.

High school was survival of the fittest and while The Moo could never be called fit, I could count on her candy addiction to keep me safe.

So my stash was secreted in my book bag. Who would ever suspect Miss Priss wasn't carrying thick tomes of Earth Science, American History, Language Arts and copies of Le Petite Prince?

Perhaps the vague whiff of mint or peanut butter might linger as telltale evidence... But nothing more... nothing more.

I was careful. I had a rep for being discreet.

So buys were made in hasty pre- and post-class rushes, slipped carefully from bag to purse, under desks, between the covers of Trapper Keepers bearing innocent kittens or rainbows. Thanks to the overall student body, plus "The Moo's" cravings, why sometimes 30-50 bars a day would change hands.

The Crispies, the Almond Bliss, the Peanut Blasts, the Mint Mind-Melts... Each one had its buyers, and I made sure the shipments kept rolling in.

Now you probably wonder-- do I feel no guilt as an illicit choco-trafficker? Do I feel no adult pang of regret over abusing the which rules our educational administration so deeply entrusted me with? Do I feel no remorse over contributing to The Moo's obvious food addiction? Or the wasteful spending of hard-earned allowances for which my smuggled goods were exchanged?

And the answer is... nah. I made it over the border to Canada. I high-tailed it to Florida once. These were, of course, pre-scheduled band trips I'd funded with the chocolate bar dough. But still.

Everyone has their price. And mine was $1 for plain, $2 for specialty.

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Question for the day: Any other former band members here? And what, if anything, did you have to sell for your fundraisers?
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Humorbloggers
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Shadowing Raoul, Deflector of Stuff

The wallet was tell-tale. Slim, black, velcro and bearing the word "KISS" in jagged letters. My friend Raoul had been here. And as this was the third time I'd retrieved that flea market KISS wallet for him that week. I was seriously considering desperate measures...

Like stapling it to his thigh.

It was high school. The 80s. KISS was in its heyday, and so was Raoul's insomnia. It made him beat the school record for most "Tardies" in a single marking period...

Which, of course, gave us the opportunity to say the word "tardy" a lot-- which was always fun because, honestly, how smart can any school system be to call "being late" a goofy word like "tardy" and not expect it would be applied to our classmates as an adjective as well as a noun?...

The insomnia also caused a remarkable phenomenon in physics, which had the science teachers scratching their comb-overs.

It seemed that during the course of any class, all loose objects which belonged to Raoul automatically lost their grippiness and were quietly and subtly repelled from the three-foot radius around his person. There, they would be left at random around the school, like part of some less-than-rewarding scavenger hunt.

We, his friends, spent much of our time collecting the items that insomnia and physics left behind.

I'd watch my cousin Jay clomp into the class on thick-laced, untied high-tops and plunk Raoul's oboe before him. "I found this in the locker room," he'd say flatly, knowing an oboe would be so much harder to staple.

I saw my bud Josette brandishing a collection of KISS and RATT bumper-stickered notebooks, and plop them down on the desk for the umpteenth time before his pale startled face. "I believe these are yours?" she'd intoned dryly, the cheer having drained from her normally-musical voice.

And then there was the wallet. Always that stupid wallet. Once again lost and found. And once again missing the cash that had been in it.

It was the one thing that prevented us from demanding Finders' Fees.

So we flash forward 18 years, and my friend Raoul is now a doctor.

No, a real one.

No, of medicine and stuff.

The world is nothing if not a beautiful and amusing place.

Yes, apparently Raoul's innate intelligence, pleasant personality, and that strange sleep schedule has paid off in unexpected ways for my ol' pal. And every now and then, when I see a black velcro wallet sporting the logo of the latest, hottest band, I think of that fine fellow, and how very far he's come.

I'm also somewhat relieved he's not a surgeon.

Oboes and Trapper Keepers are a whole lot larger than medical sponges and clamps.

And there are some places which even your closest friends cannot follow.

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Today's Question: Did one of your classmates end up in a occupation you never would have expected?

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Humorbloggers
Humor-blogs

Fig Newton, Angry Unger, and the Birth of Tyrone

As summer slips away to fall, and kids resume the routine of Readin', Writin' and Math That Makes Sense to No One Over 20, I'm reminded of my own days in the public school system. And throughout high school, much of that involved a substitute teacher we'll call Mrs. Unger.

Mrs. Unger was a gray woman. Gray hair, gray skin, gray bottle-lensed glasses and gray clothing. The reason for this was she'd already been substitute teaching through most of the heyday of ink engravings and black-and-white media. And when everything else made the switch to color, Mrs. Unger just didn't have the energy to make the leap, too.

It was we students who kept her from going Kodachrome in the 60s, I think. Decades and decades of students who drained the very the color from her day-to-day life.

We know Mrs. Unger had been teaching a long time because she told us so, every class. Whenever her authority would come into question-- even whenever a student would try to give her a helping hand-- Mrs. Unger would spit out the tally of her years in service to the school like a wad of well-used tobacco.

And for every year we encountered her, it seemed her years of teaching would increase by at least five.

"I know where the seating chart is by now, Jose Rosado!" she'd snap. "I've been substitute teaching in this school system for 27 years!"

Or...

"Don’t you tell me how to run a classroom, Marisol Nieves! After 32 years, I'd say I know very well what I'm doing without any help from the likes of you!"

Or...

"What’s that, Rodney Goldblum? No, I see it right in front of me. I haven’t been teaching for 489 years for nothing. Why, in fact, Richard III was a smart aleck just like you are. And I didn't take any lip from him, either!"

Yes, we drained her sense of time along with her color. Oh, not us specifically. But decades of students like us. We wore out her memory... her patience... her hearing...

Mrs. Unger wasn't born, she was made.

So that's why initially, many of us felt kinda sorry for her. This gray woman with features eroded into a hard, scowling mistrust.

I know initially a few of us girls thought we could soothe her with kindness. A cheerful greeting. A polite word. An olive branch, so to speak, extended from Kiddom to the adult world. Anything to see her turn from gray rock to something less cold, less impenetrable.

But it was too little, too late. Good kids, bad kids… She'd endured so much Post-Traumatic Student Syndrome over the years, we were all the same now. One hateful mass.

And that caused the birth of "Tyrone."

You see, one kid, Jerry "Fig" Newton, was kind of a joker. Fig was a pretty good guy really. A tall, broad, curly-haired kid who was as sharp on the football field as he was in the classroom. A bright kid with energy to burn off, Fig had an ornery sense of humor that couldn't quite be contained.

And this left him cracking jokes when the mood struck... offering loud tuneless serenades in the hallways... and developing the keen ability to imitate the precise sound of the bell.

It was seventh grade and all the planets had fallen into alignment. Fate brought Fig Newton to Mrs. Unger.

Mrs. Unger had subbed for our class maybe two times at this point, but whether she remembered us or not, it's hard to say. Individual faces and names seemed long ago unimportant to her. We were One. A giant seething hormonal mass, precisely the same as the kids in 1965, 1776 and in 1483, when her career had really just started taking off.

So she began each class by calling attendance. And one by one we shouted out our names.

"Orton?"

"Here!"

"Ortiz?"

"Here!"

"Newton?"

Silence.

"Newton….? Gerald Newton?"

Only Fig Newton just sat in his chair, still, patient.

"Gerald Newton?"

I don’t think anyone dared to look directly at Fig, but out of the corner of my eye, I could see his small, amused smile.

Behind her gray lenses, Mrs. Unger's gray eyes fixed on the class. "Is Gerald Newton not here?"

"He’s out sick, Miz Unger," offered Fig helpfully.

The answer pacified. Mrs. Unger made a note in the attendance book and then pressed on.

Timmons… Thorson… Varges… Weiman… West…

One by one we all responded when our names were called. Until process of elimination caused Mrs. Unger to finally turn her focus back on Jerry Newton.

Mrs. Unger frowned. "Didn't I call your name?"

"Nope," said Fig.

"Well, what is your name, then?"

"I’m Tyrone," Fig told her not missing a beat.

"Tyrone?" Mrs. Unger squinted at the list before her, trailing a finger down the chart, name after name checked and double-checked. We didn't breathe. We didn't move. A stillness had come over the class like the achingly-quiet yellow haze right before a tornado.

"I don’t see a Tyrone here," she said finally.

"I’m new," said Tyrone.

"Oh." Mrs. Unger blinked. Reread the list. And promptly penciled "Tyrone" at the bottom of the attendance list.

She went on with the class.

That's how it began, and that's how it continued.

Seventh grade… eighth grade… ninth grade… Tyrone persisted for Mrs. Unger.

Though, if pressed, I doubt she would have remembered the name of any other kid in the entire school, Mrs. Unger surely remembered Tyrone.

Tyrone once got our entire class dismissed five minutes early with his expert bell imitation, and too late did Mrs. Unger discover the truth. Armed with this knowledge going forward then, just as Tyrone made it his quest to unnerve Mrs. Unger, Mrs. Unger had pinpointed a troublemaker. And she made it her solemn mission to quash Tyrone.

So class after class, year after year, Mrs. Unger scolded Tyrone... gave Tyrone detention... sent Tyrone to the Principal’s office and wrote him up for our regular teacher.

Tyrone never felt compelled to show up for these punishments, of course-- owing to him not actually existing. But Fig Newton would enjoy a nice afternoon in the boy’s bathroom. Or the gym. Or dawdle over an early lunch. Or just go home for a pleasant freebie day.

Tyrone may have eventually gotten suspended for all I know. But Fig Newton, well, he had an impeccable school record-- if a lot of absenteeism.

Somewhere in tenth grade, Mrs. Unger did eventually find out that Jerry Newton and Tyrone were, in fact, one and the same. To this day none of my classmates remembers precisely how, and Fig, as far as I know, hasn't come clean about it.

I'd like to think it was something dramatic, like taking the mask off Spiderman only to find Peter Parker underneath it all... Like seeing beyond Clark Kent's glasses in one moment of epiphany to the Superman who was there all along...

But I imagine it was just some innocent conversation in the teacher's room over cardboard pizza and three-bean-salad, how this mysterious student, Tyrone was penciled in every time the teacher had a day off. Notes got compared. Things were mulled over. And two and two were finally put together to make four.

Even the New Math told us that.

But year after year, I remember waiting for it. That's what said "school" to me. The anticipation of gray Mrs. Unger, squinting over attendance...

And that melodic sound, as Tyrone's name echoed out over the classroom.

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The Goose Against Marching Band Battle Royale

Ah, late summer. It brings back memories of that new school supply smell, long evening shadows, the quest for autumn shoes, and the foot-ache and dread that was... band camp.

I suppose it's no surprise to any of you that I was a Bandie. In fact, my particular brand of dorkage almost definitely assured it.

Think about it: what do you do with a tall, gawky, over-achieving teen girl who trips over her own two feet and would rather be invisible?

Why, put her in an unflattering uniform complete with a hat plume shaped like a guinea pig... stuff a flute in her hand... and shove her out onto a football field in front of thousands of her peers and neighbors!

It's so obvious!

And band camp was the year's precursor to all that was guinea-pig-plumes and white rubber spats. It was one long week of summer, filled to the brim with marching, music practice, field formations and...

Geese.

Hundreds of them.

Yes, nine months out of the year, Edgar Allen Poe High School Marching Band (name changed to protect the innocent) held sway over the field outside of our place of higher learning...

And the other three months, it was home to three hundred honking, flapping, pooping and snapping Canada Geese.

With extra emphasis on those last two items.

The first day was usually the worst. The obligatory eews and Ohmigods from the woodwinds as we took our first unavoidable steps in goose guano... The territorial honks of hatred and disenfranchisement from the feathered Canadian squatters...

It pitted flautist against fowl, baritone against bird, in a determined play for power.

But usually, after several hours of 60 teens pushing 'em back, pushing 'em back, waaaay back-- and hooting and tooting louder than they ever could-- the geese would get the message. They'd concede it was a battle well fought, and graciously clear off for other fields. Like the one in front of Rico's Mexicale Casa.

Until one year, these winged wonders had apparently had enough. They weren't going to accept our Eminent Domain. No, folks-- they tossed down some feathers in front of our poo-covered tennies and they said, "Bring it." And that was the year of the Goose Against Marching Band Battle Royale.

That Band Camp started like any other one, as I recall. With flautist Krissy McCartney trying to find quality nail painting time at parade rest... Angela Armstrong rolling down the hill with her bassdrum at least once... And the Color Guard in a quest for independence and personalized flair, not quite willing to bow down to the idea of synchronization...

But as we learned our moves on the field, and crisped our skins under the blazing August sun, our beaked bystanders had not cleared off per usual. No, instead, they hung about critiquing our formations, assessing our tactics, and analyzing our weak points.

And the weakest point was apparently saxophone player Doug Minnelli. Doug, like many of us, had joined marching band less for the love of music and more for the rockin' band trip to Disney World. This was proven in his playing. Squeaking by as a second chair player, he also squeaked in terms of tone. And perhaps it was this that caught the eyes and ears of those feathered fiends.

Where Day One might have involved assessment and analysis of our protocols, Day Two they launched the attack. It started with six geese singling out Doug in particular, charging at him with wings flapping and beak snapping.

Doug retreated with a bob-and-weave move, running back into the ranks to hide in the relative safety of the tubas.

At first, we thought this was all pretty funny, since none of us were really keen on Doug's playing, either.

"Hey, Doug, maybe they think you're one of them! Maybe it's a girl goose. Better be nice to her, this could be your only chance for a girlfriend!" his fellow saxes taunted.

But each day, these protected predators continued their quest for field domination, focusing their energies on us all, but in particular on Doug Minnelli with the kind of cold calculation rival hockey teams use to wear down a star player.

Five days. Five days of goose-stepping to the latest Olympic anthem and Neil Diamond's "America" while dodging biting beaked fury.

By day three, Doug was developing an eye twitch that interfered with his music reading. By day four, we were all having nightmares about great monsters with razor-sharp talons and vice-like jaws, where our imminent demise would be preceded by a deep, hellish honk.

Eventually, we ended up spending our time inside in Orchestra Practice. Our bandleader, Mr. J., said it was because we'd be doing a few special indoor competitions this year. But we all wondered if that hadn't just been our director's way of regrouping without conceding failure. Those geese would enjoy their meadow until the frost was in the air and they'd gladly choose to leave it behind for warmer climes.

Leaving the final score-- Canada Geese: 100. Marching Band: one giant goose egg.

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