fly high aviators

i'm in the 'nati. home.

now that i get skyline in south florida and penn station in st. louis, it has lost some its allure.

last fall, i blogged at about mrs. wintermute's high school reunion (here and here). she was cool, popular, and everyone remembered who she was.

this is pretty much the opposite of me. about four months ago, when i got the email about my 10 yr reunion, i said that would be like be getting on board with snakes on a plane. unless samuel l. jackson is there for me, no way it's happening.

total decision time = 10 seconds.

i revisited that decision every time i checked the evite and saw that a few hundred of my class mates were planning to attend. but still, no dice.

about three weeks ago, teen wolf pings me. i have not seen him (or his wife) for a long time, since he shipped out (he's in the military) just before my wedding. so i was one groomsman short, and haven't seen him since. i went to junior and high school teen wolf and mrs. teen wolf. he and i played soccer together and were in a band together; basically, we go way, way back. he's one of two people from my high school with whom i keep in touch (well, three if you count my brother).

so, teen wolf pings me. he's in the states on short notice for some training, is going to be in the nati to see family, is there any chance that mrs. w and i can make our way there?

hell. yes.

total decision time = 2 seconds.

and it coincides with the aviator reunion. teen wolf is up for it, mrs. w is up for it. so we're going.

i have spent the last 3 weeks in a state of anxiety about this. it peaked the first 72 hours after i decided that we would go, and has reached a tolerable level of stasis since then.

it's not that i hate my high school. on the surface, i had it pretty good. i was on the varsity soccer team, i played in a band (not THE band, A band) that was actually quite rocking, and i even had a girlfriend my senior year. however, i don't have any feelings of affection towards that time in my life. I walked out of graduation, put my gown in the bin, and said good riddance. i figured feelings of longing would eventually arrive. ten years later, no dice. i am completely emotionally flat, at best, and supremely insecure at worst, when it comes to my high school experience.

i know, it shouldn't matter. i have a lot for which to be thankful; in fact, i haven't done much to earn or deserve most of it. it's largely been handed to me. and i've tried to not take it for granted and make the most of it. i even have some major things to brag about, if i were so inclined (a wife that's much better looking than i deserve to have and having a graduate degree from the big h, for starters).

so i really shouldn't care that i was a big tool in high school, was insecure about myself every single day, and felt completely invisible at times. but i do. i'm not sure how many people will remember my name. i expect a lot of, "hey...you...ummm, is it (insert common indian name, like sanjay, here)?"

being in the environment brings back all of those things. homecoming? 0 for 4. winter dance (where, cruelly, the girls are supposed to do the asking)? 0 for 4 as well. at a seventh grade dance, i was walking with a friend to larosa's (that's what everyone did afterwards). a car drove by, yelled "hey you fucking n&%#er" and threw some beer bottles at me. fortunately, i ducked and they shattered on the stop sign behind me. i wasn't mad. i was embarrassed, more than anything else. i told adam not to tell anyone, and just decided that school dances were not such a good idea.

in the early 90s, a neighbor (we live on a one-street neighborhood with 12 houses) had a super bowl party. guess who was the only family not invited? could it be the only family that's not white? around 5:30, my bro and i came in from playing with the neighbors. "ok, what time are we going over to the party?"

mom and dad exchange nervous looks. "uhh, i don't think we're going."

"why not?!?!?! it's going to be awesome! everyone's going to be there." i was actually mad at my parents b/c i though they were too lame to go. i found out later that we hadn't been invited. the saddest part of it is that my brother and i announced that were 'mature enough' to go without them. we ignorantly rang the doorbell. today, i understand the look of surprise on my neighbor's face when she saw us standing on the porch. her kids, not knowing better, ran up and told us to come on down to the basement where all the kids were. i can't imagine how my parents must have felt when we came that night, triumphantly, saying that we had a great time.

oh yeah, one more story: in sixth grade, i actually had a girlfriend (as much as anyone can have one...she agreed to 'go out' with me via a note in reading class). she was super cool and i felt super cool. i walked out of school that day with a big smile on my face. on my way to the bus, billy o'neil (fuck you, billy, wherever you are) said, 'hey, you don't think she's really going to keep going out with you, do you?"

"well, we've only been going out for a day."

"you know what happens when white chicks go out w/ colored kids, right? their kids are retarded."

it didn't take long for that one to get around. i was dumped by the end of the next day.

now, at the end of the day, i can't say those two incidents prevented from feeling better about myself. today, it's actually kind of laughable. the fact that kids on the playground can be mean wiil not surprise anyone. but back then, it was a little bit more difficult to digest. that kind racist bullshit repeated itself ad nauseum almost until the day i left the 'nati (literally. one of the last days before i went to college, some asshole came into the movie theater where i worked and hassled me about letting dumb immigrants into the country. it's a humbling experience to serve someone their popcorn, make change, and tell them to enjoy their movie while they denigrate your background).

then i went to emory, and realized that the rest of the country is not like this. i've pretty much been blocking out ages 11 to 18 since then. this includes my high school girlfriend's dad beating her because i wasn't catholic (did you know they sell special make-up to hide those bruises?).

but when i'm around my high school, i still feel like i'm stuck in one of those moments. i'm almost 30, but it's what i woke up thinking about this morning.

i need to clean up the pity party and move on.