Despite the fact that I’ve been alive for approximately fifteen and a half years, this past Saturday it only just occurred to me that I’ve been brainwashed.  Not like aliens taking me in my sleep and poking freakish cords at me so that I tell them every nitty gritty secret about human life kind of brainwashed.  More like media brainwashed.  Yes.  I reluctantly admit that the media, the fads, the trends, have consumed by inner being.

 

I don’t know whether it’s the media or not, actually.  Now that I think about it, it might just be high school.  Well, since I really like blaming the crucial issues in my life on external forces, I think I’ll blame everything on the media.  I hate the media.

 

Ever since the beginning of the year, I’ve been fighting this constant battle to be different.  At first, I would take that ruled paper and say to myself “Hm, maybe I should write the other way.”  I felt pretty accomplished after I did that.  Then, by December, I started writing the same way as the ruled paper was asking me to go.  Why?  Because everyone else was writing the other way.  But, eventually I found that writing the way I was supposed to write was totally against the point I was trying to get across to myself.  So then I started writing on furniture.

 

What does that have to do with brainwashing?  Quite simple, actually.  You see, brainwashing the adolescent population is the easiest thing ever.  Like taking candy from a baby, injecting a large sum of nicotine into it, and then sticking it back in their toothless mouths. The media does it to us.  And we do it to each other. 

 

Top Three Ways the Average Trend Stalking Teen Has Sold Their Souls to The Media

 

1. Music:  Remember that time?  That time when all your friends used to listen to z100 and think that it was the only music on earth? That there was just nothing but Christina, Britney, and Da Club?  Remember that?  Yeah.  Maybe that’s because it was only six months ago.  It could also be because we were brainwashed then, too.  However, I am strongly convinced that Middle School just has a certain magical way of getting all of its awkward inhabitants to thoroughly enjoy the worst music on earth.

 

But what about now? What have so many of us done in order to rebel from our younger selves and further emphasize the fact that we’ve ‘matured’ and grown out of that stage?  I have three words for you:  Indie and Oldies. 

 

Ever since that OC mix 1 and the Garden State soundtracks came out, people have decided to ditch the sugary crap on z100 for good songs.  If I were an Indie kid, a kid who’s basic lifelong goal is to be described as ‘so twenty minutes from now’, this would piss me off to the extreme.  These followers, these booty shaking z100ers, these bandwagon tag-alongs, are stealing my music. However, I’m not an Indie kid.  I am a wannabe Indie kid.  One that discovered such songs from artists that are signed to independent record companies a mere ten minutes before The Shins replaced Kelly Clarkson on the popularity scale.  I should have nothing to complain about, because I didn’t necessarily discover that music.  However, I did think I was being original.  That I was being understatedly cool. That no one would ever discover my newly found treasure. 

 

Then, Seth Cohen had to like Death Cab and all hell broke loose.

 

Oldies music is not necessarily a ‘trend’ in the sense.  Most people have always liked the occasional Beatles or Billy Joel songs that they heard blasting in their parent’s cars.  In fact, I’m pretty sure the only way oldies music has become a new obsession is because it’s just all around good music.  The kind that when you’re young, you want nothing to do with.  “Eww, you listen to mommy’s music!” you might have heard in fifth grade.  But now it’s okay.  What is not okay, however, is the constant need for everyone to know every single song, every single popular band that existed between the ‘60’s and the 80’s and then talk condescendingly to those who don’t.  There is a difference between liking oldies music and liking the idea of liking oldies music. 

 

There is also a difference between liking The Beatles, and liking the shirt that says ‘The Beatles’.

 

Yes, yes.  We’ve all seen the Ramones shirts. And yes, The Beatles, The Doors, Pink Floyd, have also been manufactured as clothing merchandise.  There is nothing wrong with wearing a shirt that has the name of your favorite band on it, either.  Not at all.  But, if you happen to be someone that has liked the oldies for a longer period of time than the average teenager, this could piss you off about as much as the Indie kids currently are.  I can’t recall how many times the occasional guy wearing a Led Zeppelin tee has come up to me asking  “So.  You are wearing a Beatles shirt.  You do know they’re a band right?” 

 

No, really? I thought they were a fruit.

 

Overall, the mass change in music taste has been a positive one.  And although the angry Indie and Oldies kids want their music back for themselves, they must know one thing: good music isn’t really a possession.  And it really shouldn’t be entirely used to further express your individuality from everyone else.  Think about it.  It’s a sound that people enjoy.  Music should be shared by everyone; it should bring people together. Think about it, Indie and Oldies kids.  The former z100ers have finally been enlightened. 

 

2. Clothes:  I already mentioned the band shirts, so now I’m going to get down to the really dirty stuff. 

The main thing I hate about this generation of trends is that it isn’t really our generation.  Notice that each decade of the twentieth century had its own distinct style.  Tens had puffy dresses.  Twenties had flapper dresses.  Thirties had…rags? The forties had the wardrobe in The Notebook.  The fifties had sideburns and poodle skirts.  Sixties had tie dye and bell bottoms.  Seventies had afros and platforms.  Eighties…big hair and leggings.  Nineties...grunge.  Thousands?  Zip.  Zilch.  Nada.

 

Sure, the thousands have only been around for about five years.  But all I’ve seen flashing through the pages of those sparkly teen trend magazines are headlines such as ‘Forties are FAB’ and ‘Eighties are IN’.  In all honesty, this decade is nothing more or less than an oversized time warp.  The fashion world has just run straight out of ideas, now improvising with hand-me-downs from the past.

 

Either that, or Y2K really did have a negative effect on people’s minds.

 

Hey, at least we’re past that whole “98.3572859743 % Angel!!!” tee-shirt phase.  That, my friends, was just gruesome.

 

3. Entertainment:  Looking back on television ten years ago, Full House was pure quality.  So was America’s Funniest Home Videos and Friends.  And then what?  And then Paris Hilton strutted her stuff onto The Simple Life and our idea of entertainment became about as wholesome as a rotting tooth.

 

Notice that the content of Reality Television is the exact opposite of its title.  Honestly.  When was the last time you walked onto a farm and saw two orange-skinned Barbie dolls planting corn seed?  Quoting Simon Cowell, “I don’t mean to be rude but” Paris Hilton really needs to swallow her squeaky Chihuahua, choke, and die.

 

As you may have concluded, I am not a big fan of Reality Television.  However, I am nonetheless a major fan of overly dramatic soap operas and sitcoms.  My top three being Desperate Housewives, That 70’s Show, and The OC.  Although the order varies depending on the quality of the most recent episode. 

 

What people these days have been getting carried away with is the Guilty Pleasure regime.  Desperate Housewives is an okay Guilty Pleasure entirely because it is truly a high-quality show.  The plot makes sense, the characters are well-developed, and the script doesn’t sound like a kindergartener scrawled it on a napkin during art class.  It’s equivalent to a dieter taking a break and snacking on a fruit roll-up.  Shows like Supernanny and The Bachelor are televised proof of the decaying values of our society.  These shows are equal to the average third grader’s stash of Halloween candy.  Our values have sunk so low that some of us look forward to watching toddlers throw belligerent temper tantrums in department stores once a week.  Not to mention, The Bachelor has proven to be about 70 % unsuccessful.  As far as I can remember from the tabloids, only about one or two couples from that show have actually remained couples.  There is just too much pressure, too little time, and too many good-looking people on those types of shows for the True Love concept to even set a molecule on the set. 

 

Bottom Line: Read books.

 

 

 

After reading this, I’m sure some of you are offended.  You may be defending yourselves, saying that you swear you like the Ramones.  You may be defending your taste in music, saying you always bopped your head to Snow Patrol.  You may be defending your favorite show, saying that Paris Hilton is in fact a real person. 

 

All I’ve done is state what I’ve seen, what I am seeing, what I wish I wasn’t seeing. 

 

And all I’m hinting is…

 

Maybe you’ve been brainwashed, too.

 

My Serious Problem

 

“You know, you have a serious problem, Daryl,” my kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Hartman, said to me toward the end of one extended recess, “Do you know what your problem is?”

 

I stopped to think as I emptied my overall pockets, which were stuffed senseless with all the sparkly pebbles I had stolen off the ground of the school’s playground. Spending the majority of my recess with my back arched toward the ground, I would take about thirty a day, leaving a small patch of the land bare and muddy. I planned on using them to sell to my peers for ten cents each, mainly because I was cheap and liked the idea of collecting shiny things.  Why my teachers thought I was psychotic, I had not a clue. 

 

“Umm…”  If I had a bigger vocabulary, I probably would have responded with something along the lines of ‘I pick useless, worthless pebbles off the ground and sell them to my oblivious peers by means of making a profit and eventually spending it all on my beanie baby collection.”

 

Instead, I said “I push boys in the mud.”

 

“Exactly.” Mrs. Hartman said instantly after my response.  She paused.  “Wait.  No. No, not that. But I will definitely add that to my list of everything that is wrong with you. No. What your biggest problem is, Daryl, is that you don’t have any self control.

 

I nodded my head almost too intensely as to express my strong agreement.  She smiled, patted me reassuringly on the back, told me to “Stop collecting shiny things before you turn into an even more obsessive compulsive version of Gollum” and walked off to further complicate the lives of other confused six year olds.

 

After the whistle blew, I returned to my friends with only two questions burning in my mind:

 

What is a shelf troll?  And why don’t I have one?

 

 

Train of Thought (Also known as 'The Rambles of a Not-Yet-Diagnosed ADD/OCD Patient')

 

Years later, I would find out that ‘self control’ was a term used by those of higher authority to further separate themselves from the lesser beings of society that spend the majority of their lives pondering impossible possibilities while not doing their homework at the exact same time. 

 

That is my definition, anyway.  I guess I never really got a grasp of the true meaning of the word ‘control.’  I often just skim around it, catch a brief glimpse at what it looks like.  Control?  It means organization.  Control? Oh, it means to have limits. Control? Doesn’t that mean to be steady? Paced? Frizz-free? But because I apparently lack in the ‘control’ department, I have learned to replace that word with better ones. 

 

For example, what I lack in self control, I make up for in self absorbance.

 

I’m so deeply self-absorbed that I talk to myself.  Not just like “Oh, crap, I forgot the stapler.”  It’s more along the lines of “Oh, crap, you forgot the stapler.”

 

Now it comes naturally, but back in the fifth grade, my friends and I used to make bets with each other to see how long we could refer to ourselves in the third person.  Daryl wants to jump rope.  Daryl wants your jello.  I hate you, said Daryl.  However, this method was found to be unsuccessful after and my teacher, Mrs. Morrissey, called on me and my frantically waving hand.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Daryl has to go to the bathroom.”

 

“Daryl? Aren’t you Daryl?”

 

“She says yes.  Can she go to the bathroom?”

 

“No.”

 

“Daryl says why not?”

 

“Just no.”

 

“Daryl says she’s really gotta go.”

 

She thought for a moment. 

 

“Fine, but be back soon.”

 

Then she walked over to the other side of the blackboard and handed me one of the hall passes.  The one that, etched in blue ink, read ‘Guidance.’

 

Actually, back then I didn’t even use the word ‘bathroom’.  Up until the beginning of seventh grade, I called it the Potty.  In kindergarten, first and second grade it was considered cute.  By the time we were learning times tables in third grade, people began questioning.  In fourth grade, there was just nothing funnier than the little fat kid in the pink ruffled leggings skipping around whining “Wahhh, wahhhh, I have to go to the potty.  Wahhh.”  In fifth grade, it just led to more meetings with the guidance counselor.  In sixth grade, after I entered middle school and felt profoundly inferior in comparison to everyone else, I used it as a tool to express my individuality right along with my spandex tie-dye pants and tarot cards.  And eventually, after a few months into seventh grade, I came to the conclusion that the kids weren’t teasing me because I still watched the Rugrats, but because of my ability to talk like one. 

 

I’ve also come to the conclusion that when I write in this journal, I only talk about how strange I am.  You may also notice that all the strange instances never reach past the seventh grade.  I could tell you it’s because I’ve officially grown out of the whole I’m A Freak But I’m Okay With That phase.  But in all honesty, I’m really not.  In fact, I’m probably stranger than I’ve ever been in my entire life.  I just don’t talk about it that often because my current weirdness is well….current.  Meaning that I’m still living in it.  And since I talk to myself and therefore consider myself a separate person from myself, I don’t feel comfortable gossiping about me. 

 

So instead I’ll talk about what I really want to do right now.  Which is go outside and scream really loud.  It would probably feel very relieving.  However, just like everything else I really want to do, the consequences are endless.  For one, I live in the suburbs.  For two, the last time I did that, every dog in the neighborhood starting howling.  For three, I’ve been pretty good at concealing my insanity recently.  I’m on a role, in fact.  Therefore, no. 

 

I also want to stage dive and/or crowd surf.  But considering the fact that the most rowdy concert I’m allowed to go to is Zootopia, I’m pretty sure that is not going to happen for at least the next four years.  I want to go to a crazy concert with good music. Crowd surfing at Zootopia.  That would only be crazy in the sense that the people lifting me up would be less than ninety pounds, age twelve, wearing belly shirts, and female.

 

I just realized that this entry is aimless and way too long.

But, I always wanted to write an aimless entry, anyway.

 

So now that I accomplished that, I’m going to go to my room and draw my broken lava lamp.  Which represents me on so many levels. 

“Bill! Come over here!  Look at this!”

“What’s it now, Timmy?” Bill shouted above the swishing wind.

“Just come over here!”

“Fine.”  He crunched his way toward Timmy while shielding the snowflakes from flying into his reddened face.

“It’s something, huh?”

“Well, it’s different, I guess.”

“Tyler told me it was safe.”

“Fat Tyler? You’re going to listen to Fat Tyler.”

“Yeah…so?”

“You’re nuts.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes.  Yes, you are.”

“C’mon, Bill.  You know he’s not that bad. 

“Yes he is.”

“He’s not!”

“Yeah. I guess all that power-hungry, horrible stuff he does to kindergarteners would be considered…well, loving.

“Huh?”

“Nevermind.”

“Wait…what?”

“Just forget it.”

“Bill, Tyler’s nice!

“Oh yeah…he’s a charmer.”

“What’d you say about kindergarteners?”

“Nothing. Just forget I said that.”

“If you don’t tell me I’ll…”

“You’ll what?

“I’ll tell mommy about your little drive to-“

“You wouldn’t.”

“Wanna bet?”

“Fine.  I’ll tell.  But don’t go spreading it to all your little buddies, okay? 

“Pinky promise.”

“Well.  This is a pinky promise we’re dealing with now.  No screwing around.  You mess this up, and you may want to actually stick a needle in your eye.  Comprende?”

“I don’t even know what that’s supposed to mean!”

“It means this is serious business.”

“Yeah, I knew that.  But Tyler wouldn’t be mean, anyway!”

“Well, since you’re such a smart little guy…”

“Yeah?”

“Eat that ‘something’ you were raving about.”

“Ha, I’m not a dummy.  You told me it wasn’t safe!”

“I was kidding.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh.”

“Try it.”

“Okay.  See…I knew you thought Tyler wasn’t mean…” Timmy crouched down and shoved a handful of the stuff into his mouth. 

“Well, how was it?” asked Bill.

Timmy made a face and spit the stuff out.

“That,” he said disdainfully, “Was not lemon ice cream.”

“Happy Hallmark Day, numb nuts,” Zeus said to me this morning just before he took his newly sharpened lightning bolt and effortlessly thrust it into the head of some pathetic mortal walking his dog several thousand miles below.    I watched from afar as the man instantly dropped dead, leaving his dog alone and panic-stricken. 

 

“Aw, now why’dya have to do that?” I said; my voice soaked in weighty guilt, “I mean, you could have at least aimed at the heart.  Kill ‘em slowly, that’s the way it’s done.” 

 

Zeus just rolled his eyes and stormed away, creating a trail of scorched cloud behind him.  Before he was completely out of my sight, he turned around, his voice booming in my ears.  “It’s a good thing you aren’t a mortal, Cupid.  Because I hate you.  And I hate your stupid holiday.”  Just before I could manage to penetrate a single one of my arrows into one of his glistening eyeballs, he shoveled his massive hand below the sky and into the ground and unearthed a giant redwood tree.  In a matter of seconds, that redwood transferred from his iron fists of fury into my belly button of steal. Although I didn’t actually feel a thing, the impact totally messed up my hair.  I truly wanted to murder him just then, but he was Zeus after all. My face reddened with defeat as he coolly swept back the silvery hair from his face.  He nodded to the crushed redwood.  “Why don’t you just make another billion mushy lovey-dovey cards?  And while your at it, apologize to Mother Nature over there,” he averted his eyes over to a slimy green woman that was angrily gritting her wooden teeth over on a nearby cloud. “She hates you, too.  And she wants her trees back.” Then, Zeus stuck out his tongue in disgust, turned around and left for good. Moments later, Mother Nature came over with a series of useless death threats that I responded to with the mass murder of several redwood giants in Yellowstone.    

 

You could blame it on St. Valentine.  Hallmark.  Godiva.  Love, even.  But if you really want to know the truth about who spawned Valentine’s Day, it wasn’t really any of them.  They’re just subjects, just warriors, just servants of the one that truly brought about that dreadful holiday.  They just pitched in.  Added on to the evil scheme.

 

I’m Cupid.  And Valentine’s Day is all. my. fault. 

 

 

 

Oh, but why, Cupid?  Why would you do such a thing?

 

I guess the answer to that question could be directly related to my childhood. Being raised by not a single guardian, I attended Fairy Prep School and lived in one of its janitor closets.  I ate orange peels and I drank whatever I could grind into a liquid. As a kid, I was what you mortals might call ‘An Outcast’.  However, back then I was also known for possessing several other names as a result of confrontation from my peers.  ‘Naked Midget’ and “Cellulite Cheek Boy’ being among the most popular. 

 

I had no idea why these kids teased me.  I mean, as far as I was concerned I was an attractive fellow.  Golden curls, a dashing grin.  And a real knack for archery.  But for some reason my peers just couldn’t see that side of me.  In fact, the only thing I ever heard uttered from their mouths were phrases similar or identical to cat calls such as “Hey, look up at the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! No- wait!  It’s a heart-shaped ass!” 

And as much as I tried to argue against it, as much as I tried to persuade my friends that my bottom was in fact concealed, everyone was nonetheless immovably convinced that I was permanently a naked man.

 

It was not until I came to the despairing conclusion, when I went to the bathroom and found that I had nothing to unzip or pull down, that maybe these people were onto something. 

 

“Hey, Manboobs!  What’s shakin’? No, besides those…”

 

…Needless to say, I was traumatized.  All those months, all those years, all those stabbing nicknames and harsh cat calls.  And I couldn’t listen to a single one of them.   Butt-naked, I would turn up my nose and insist that I was a clothed man. 

 

“Looks like it’s gonna be a full moon tonight...”

 

 …And I just couldn’t take the pressure.  The pressure of all those hurtful words catapulting into my heart.   Causing me to spend hours on end sobbing in my lonely janitor closet, wondering where in the hell did I ever go wrong?

 

Because I’m a very irrational person and because I often listened to angry rock music, I never really figured that answer out.  In fact, if nothing was really wrong with me before, the following actions I performed could easily have filled in for an answer to that question that constantly throbbed in my head. 

 

“Hey, Bubblebutt.  You’re attracting werewolves.” 

 

The anger just consumed me.  That’s all I can really say without sounding like an aspiring serial killer.  Because I am.  But the rage just ate me alive.  Just twisted my insides into a knot of tightened fury.  I knew I had to do something.  So one day I came into Fairy Prep.  Armed.  With a bow and several arrows that I stole from Aphrodite.  And I shot everyone.

 

Unfortunately, I managed to kill no one. 

 

In fact, the only thing my school-shooting produced was a bunch of gleaming and drunken expressions of longing and happiness.  Not only was there still life in that building, but there were people making out by lockers.  Dancing. Singing. Smiling. Hugging. Eating. Partying. Reciting…..

 

poetry.

 

My reaction was something along the lines of “Wow, I suck at archery.” But eventually that morphed into a “My plan! My plan has failed.  Now I need to find a new way to kill everyone because I’m short, naked, and insecure.” 

 

So,

 

I rounded up a bunch of those little talking Hershey kisses, transformed them into evil robots that contained ten times more sugar and carbohydrates than what would be considered rational, inserted them into containers that resembled the shape of my butt,  convinced everyone these candies were healthy when really I just wanted everyone to become obese and die of high cholesterol.  I created this company called ‘Hallmark’ which is a direct simile to ‘We chop down the essence of nature and grind them into small pieces of paper containing an excessive amount of glitter’. And then I continued along on my shooting spree and eventually blamed the entire disaster on this guy named St. Valentine. 

 

My shivering peers liked to call this event the “Angry Naked Fairy Massacre”.  However, I credit it as “Valentine’s Day”.  Just so that I’m not sent to hell. 

 

Some say love is blind.  And with my existence, this saying can be proven accurate.  Just three hundred years ago, I harnessed up a handful of doctors who eventually came to a very serious conclusion.  Stating that I was so convinced I was clothed as a child, so sure that my fellow students were incorrect, because I could not see the truth for myself.  For the first few thousand years of my life, I was blind. 

 

That is why I could not see that I had no clothes on my body. 

That is why I always got lost.

That is why I couldn’t shoot an arrow for my life.

And that is why Michael Jackson is sexually attracted to little boys.

 

I am blind.  Love is blind.

 

And no one can escape from my heart shaped chocolates, sugary greeting cards, and especially the magical randomness of my efficient bow and arrow.

 

I bumped into Zeus and his sister Demeter later today.  And, being that today is my day, he didn’t look too pleased.  No one has, really.  But he looked exceptionally pissed off.

“You look exceptionally pissed off.” I said, mocking a sympathetic expression.

He glared at me, his eyes two reddening hot coals.  His fists clenched.

“How would you know, anyway?” he thundered as Demeter giggled superciliously, “You’re as blind as Oedipus moments before he croaked.”

I smiled cunningly.  “Oh, that is true,” I whispered,“But I have an excellent sense of hearing.”

And just before Zeus could say or do anything, I withdrew my bow an arrow and swiftly shot, the arrow missing his bicep by a few inches and penetrating into the heart of his sister instead. Her look of concern toward her brother instantly transformed into longing.

 

“Hey, I can’t help it if I’m blind,” I said, “Kind of like how your future children can’t help the fact that they’ll have extra limbs.”

I've come to the conclusion that all twelve year olds suck.  All of them.  Every last one.  It's just a known fact.  Black is the opposite of white.  The average sheet of computer paper measures eight and a half by eleven inches.  George Washington was America's first president.  My alarm clock will go off at 6:45 am Monday morning. And all twelve year olds suck. 

You could be the coolest eleven year old in the world.  You could have everything going for you with your good grades and that spot on the little league soccer team that's named after something destructive and powerful like 'The Comets' or the 'Thunderbolts'.  You could be 'the cute one' in the family.  But no matter how well you are doing at life, how perfect it may all seem, it will all go downhill once that fateful twelfth birthday bombards its way into your life.  I don't just know, I promise. 

I guess it may sound pretty harsh when I say that once a kid turns twelve they might as well lock themselves up in some electrically-fenced up metal box for the next 365 days, but face it, it's pretty much the truth.  To the extreme, anyway. But how, you may wonder, do I know this?

I was twelve once.  I was that sixth grader who wanted to make as much a statement as Paris Hilton did when she made that kinkilly nasty video.  I was that kid who's lifelong goal was to be featured in the Limited Too catalog.  I was the hopeless one that, not under the demand of some night plowling whore, caked on that blue glitter eye shadow and pranced around in public while there were young, not-yet corrupted children lurking around.  It's the curse of middle school, basically.  I wanted to put the 'teen' in preteen.  So when people looked at me they wouldn't think 'poser' but drop their jaws and exclaim 'Christ almighty! It's the next Hillary Duff!"

I sucked at the age of twelve.  My cousins sucked at the age of twelve.  Shirley Temple lost her job at the age of twelve.  Hilary Duff destroyed the Disney Channel by trying out for Lizzie McGuire at the age of twelve.  My sister is twelve. 

In essence, twelve is the new thirteen.

So ya wanna know why I didn’ clean de cafeteria yestaday.  Well, I’ll tell you why.  I’ll tell yous all why. Jus’…jus’ don’ go ‘round spreadin’ it, okay? Don’ want dis here janitor to get de sack, now, do ya? Aight, den.  I’ll tell yous why.

 

 It’s ‘cause de room next to de cafeteria is de principal’s office.  And in dat principal’s office is one o’ dem desks.  An’ unda dat desk was de principal…..heh….and dah secretary.  Get the pictcha?  Yeah, not a pretty one, huh?

Well, dat’s jus’ what I saw.  Choo think I was smilin’ when I saw Mista Stolaski (mista as in he’s married - he ain’t no gentleman) foolin’ ‘round with Ms. Wutherberg dis aftanoon?  Think again.  Afta I saw dat scene, it seemed to me dat one of dose toilets I’d jus’ cleaned would soon be all dirty again, if ya know what I’m sayin’. I didn’ know whatta do. I mean, how would the Missus feel if she found out ‘bout dis?  Wouln’ be too happy, I reckon.  Her heart would be ‘bout as broken as locka numba 266. An’ I can fix a tonnah things.  Furn’ture, toilets, tiles, wires, pipes, bulbs, locks.   But a broken heart? Dat’s one o’ da few things dat I can’t fix up.  I’d ben workin fo’ mista Stolaski fo’ years.  ‘Bout one third o’ my life.  An’ I guess I always thought dat he was, ya know, a trustworthy fella.  Heh…trustworthy my moldy mop.  Whatta scrap o’ scum.  Whatta puddle o’ puke. If he was left on da floor, I sure as hell wouldn’ put him in de ‘cyclin bin.  Oh, no, no I wouldn’t.  Mista Stolaski? Cheatin’ Stolaski?  Eh, I’d make sure he’d git his sticky self crushed b’neath somebody’s sneaka fo’ good.  Hell, if only dat could be possible.  I dunno what I’m gonna do.  All I knows is dat Mista Stolaski doesn’ deserve his Missus.  Afta dat inc’dent unda his office desk….i ‘spect he doesn’ deserve shit.  So dat’s it, I reckon. Yeah. So dat’s why I didn’ finish cleanin’ de cafeteria yestaday.

 

 

The above text was a monodrama I wrote last year for Language Arts.  Yes.  I turned that exact paper in to Mr. Oppel, my teacher.  And received it back a week or so later with a big, fat, delicious ‘A’ next to the title. 

 

WHAT?!?!?!?!?!11/ AN ‘A’?!?!?

 

You might be thinking. 

 

YOU GOT AN ‘A’ BY IMITATING AN ILLITERATE JANITOR WHO CAUGHT HIS BOSS SCREWING THE SECRETARY?!?!?!?!?  AN A?!?!1!!?!1

 

Why, yes. I did. 

 

HOW?!1?

 

You may ponder.

 

Well, it’s quite simple, really.

 

You see, a long, long time ago in a faraway land that its little inhabitants liked to refer to as “Middle and Elementary School”; teachers had resplendent gold stars placed on your tests and papers.  They had shiny, flawless apples lined up on their desks, so smooth and lustrous that they reflected the beaming smiles smacked across these teacher’s faces. They had Harry Potter as required reading.  Snack time. But most importantly, they possessed this thing called. This thing called.  What’s it called? Umm.  Oh yes.  A Sense of Humor. 

 

A Sense of Humor, for those of you who don’t remember or who happened to have suffered a traumatic childhood, is, in MiddleandElementarySchoolese, the ability a teacher possesses that allows him or her to go beyond the rigid boundaries of the contemporary teaching curriculum and etiquette, do their own thing, make a ton of mistakes, and laugh at themselves as well as at you.  They try to please their students, not test them periodically.  Not salivate over excruciating unofficial contests such as Who Can Stay Awake the Longest.  Or Who Can Read The Most Pages Before Suffering a Most Painful Suicide. They do not punish and scold to merely reinforce their authority. They forbid all those Time Outs and Corners and Detentions, Suspensions, and Reports to the Principal’s Offices unless some truly unforgiving act had been performed. They let loose, taking their fists of fury and shaking them with rage, not at their students, but at that stubborn, unrelenting cement wall that blatantly separates education and learning from all that is considered fun and entertaining.  “Screw you and your alphabetically arranged seating charts too!” they scream as they telepathically set fire to all unreasonable rules and regulations, all intimidating scolds and monstrously weighty textbooks, infuriating the system even more with a quick “Who needs number two pencils when you can use milky pens?”

 

In shorter terms, they are funny.

 

The Funny Teacher is a rare and beautiful specimen.  ‘Rare’ because they are quite difficult to encounter and anyone can mistake a fraud for the real deal.  ‘Beautiful’ because these people can make you talk about learning in such a way that your parents might come up to you one night suspiciously after watching School of Rock asking “…Ehmm, does your English teacher happen to be somewhat…hairy?”

 

Mr. Oppel was not hairy.  Nor was he a bum that transformed our entire class into some amateur rock band.  In fact, all Mr. Oppel was, was a tired looking, metro sexual man whose life depended solely on an eight ounce cup of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee.   But this guy, this completely conventional guy, could make you laugh.  Telling us that he only enjoys going to movie theaters on weekdays so that he has the entire place to himself. Telling us about that one time when some fat guy happened to be the only other man in the theater with him and nonetheless decided, out of all the other seats to choose from, to sit beside my teacher. And obnoxiously chomp on mountains of buttery popcorn for the first thirty minutes in, shouting on the occasion “OOF! That’s gotta hurt! Didja see that?” Telling us about how of course he could see it, you idiotic whale.  Telling us that the Mexican lunch ladies will never put the change back in your hand, only on your tray, even if you extend you palm right in front of their foundation-caked faces.  Causing our entire class to try this experiment, resulting in several Spanish curse words and the soft clatter of coins on plastic.

 

I guess you had to be there.

 

The other type of entertaining teacher is the fraud.  People, however, tend to get the two types mixed up.  A Funny Teacher involves laughing with the teacher.  With a fraud, you are merely laughing at them.  Or smiling out of pity.

 

Such, is the following real-life experience:

 

We were passing an obese, hairy pig up to his furry nostrils in manure and mud.  We zombie-walked to the next stable, housing yet another, equally massive hog.  And then onto the next stable, containing only a lonely, useless pile of...

 

“HEY!” said my art teacher, Mrs. Zerbie, as she waved to us and pointed to the pile of hay in the stable.  There was a solemn moment of silence. Then, everyone nodded sincerely, politely certifying the fact that despite her failing attempt at making us fourth graders enjoy this agonizing field trip to Merry Meade Farm, it was nonetheless the thought that counted.  “Yes, I do believe what she just said was supposed to be funny,” my peers thought as they endured the image of yet another moldy farm animal, “Let’s laugh.  Maybe she’ll throw in a sticker or something.”

 

Currently, I’ve been lacking in the Funny Teacher department.  What was once “Write a monodrama about anything you want, anything.   No boundaries here. Just make sure it’s at least a paragraph long, okay?….Hey, you can even add in a curse word if you find it necessary” mutated into “Five paragraphs. Double Spaced.  Topic: Mercantilism.  Due tomorrow, bitches.” 

 

The only funny thing about that is that my teachers don’t actually call us ‘bitches’. They are thinking it, however.

 

I wish the excessive amount of sleepily boring work that is hoisted onto our already sixty-pound backpack clad shoulders was the result of the pure sadistic nature of teachers today, however, this is highly doubtable.  I think, but I’m not quite positive, that they actually believe this stuff is in fact…good for us.

 

Nuh uh.  We don’t need anymore structured essays and narrowed thesis’s.  Useless dates and perpetuating equations.  I need to laugh.  That is what I need.

 

I did it yesterday.  I silently laughed to myself as some clueless space-cadet crashed head-on into the vending machine during lunch and moments later got up as if nothing was wrong.  I laughed even more, for some reason, when the kid turned around, pretending to be nonchalant, to see if anyone had witnessed the incident. Only to find me staring back at him with all-knowing eyes.  Panic-stricken, he stumbled away.  I laughed to myself yesterday.  And it felt like when I did it, all the stiff, numbing icicles clinging to the crevices of my usually solemn face shimmied off, replaced by a comfortingly warm feeling.

 

No, I don’t believe I urinated in my pants.  I think I did something else. This thing.  This thing called.  This thing called. I think it’s called

 

Smiling? 

 

I think I did that.

 

So, um, yeah. Dat’s why forgot to throw out my lunch in de cafeteria yestaday.

 A hand grips tightly around my arm.  I spin around.

“What do you want from me?” I say; panic surging though my veins, shooting up my spine, extending to the tips of my toenails, piercing every joint in my body with an eerie sensation of numbness. Leaving me paralyzed into a state of stupor and paranoia.   I squint, recklessly seeking an escape.  But lights are flashing sporadically in every given direction.  So bright that they seer through my eyes like deadly light sabers and assemble a home for themselves in my cobwebby cottage of a brain where I am forced to witness their spontaneous, luminescent flashes even when the windows to their home are bolted shut. And they just continue to spark to this abrupt, consistent thump that ceaselessly stomps on the remains of my hearing.  Boom. Boom.  Boom.  A ceremonial tribal beat.  A death omen.  And all these obscure, menacing silhouetted figures glide and twirl around in disarray to the understatedly creepy sound, advancing toward me with each quivering vibration of the beat. And oh, god. They’re after me.  They’re all out to get me.  Boom. Boom. Boom.  They’re crowding around me now.  Air! Space! Breathe!  But I can’t.  Too many blurry bodies beckoning me to join them, tugging impatiently at my stiff, impliable arms, pleading me, unknowingly pushing me down, crushing me as they continue to grip and beg and shift repeatedly to that god-awful noise. 

 

“Daryl…” one hisses icily, the words coldly sliding just below the wrath of that dictating beat. Boom. Boom. Boom. And I really know what they want.  But never.  No way will I ever let them have it.  I will not give in.  They can keep closing in, grabbing on, pulling, pushing.  But there is just no way.  I’ll fight-

“Daryl…” it utters again.  I’m as rigid as a high dive, as stolid as a lifeless boulder, as flexible as the line that separates life from death.  I gaze into the shadowy face of the speaker and listen in to what will undoubtedly be my merciless death sentence. 

 

“Gawsh, Dar.” It whines, “We know you hate school dances, but this is just ridiculous."

*Names have been slightly altered.

 

“You’re a Jew?” *Collin Thompson once asked me in the beginning of science class during the sixth grade.  I just squinted back at him, trying to seek some intimation of intelligent life in his naïve eyes.  Clearly, there was none.  Because the last thing I said to Collin Thompson before he interrogated me was “Yeah.  I’m a Jew.”  However, there will always be the occasional person one will inevitably stumble across that does not have a hearing impairment, yet nonetheless needs everything you say to be repeated twice.

 

“Yes, Collin, I am a Jew.” I said again, slowly.  I watched as he furrowed his freckled brow in intense concentration.  Ostensibly pondering some deeply intricate thought.  After a good thirty seconds, he awakened from his trance and triumphantly pounded his fist against his desk, startling several people who, in response, turned around to see what remarkable discovery Collin Thompson had unearthed.

 

“So that must mean…you’re Jewish.”

 

Did I mention this was accelerated sixth grade science?

 

However, before I could let out even the slightest condescending remark, that I highly doubt Collin would have even understood, let alone take offensively, someone brushed past me and took the seat next to the freckled class-A moron.  *Bob Caine.

 

Just the name itself (although I didn’t write the actual name just in case someone from Wissahickon Middle is reading this and plans on using it as some pointless blackmail mechanism) made me melt into a useless blob of sugary pink goo of hopeless longing. Obsession could only describe the fact that I wrote the initials BC on my hands every time I couldn’t erase him from my mind.  “BC? What’s that supposed to mean?” the occasional suspicious acquaintance might ask.  “Oh, um.  You know.  Before Christ.  I’m just studying for social studies.” Love could only describe the way I willingly made a fool of myself in front of the entire fifth grade class by brutally losing to his third grade sister in a rollerblading race…just to get him to talk to me.  Sickeningly possessed enough to pluck a hair from his head during lunch one day and use it to perform some witchy voodoo magic trick to get him to fall madly in love with me: Yes. It summarizes a line from Mean Girls and my sixth grade life story quite accurately. Although I think in Mean Girls it was a used Kleenex.  But that’s beside the point. 

 

As Bob chose the seat next to Collin, I stared at him with eyes that could easily be mistaken for that of a sick puppy’s.  His golden hair.  Those bright green eyes.  That crooked grin.  He gave me one brief glance and turned to Collin. 

 

“Of course she’s Jewish,” he snorted, “Her nose is like…huge.”

 

 

“You’re a Jew?” Collin Thompson once asked me.  Several times.  And yet if the question were only asked once, it would not have been that abnormal.  Wissahickon Middle School had more ninety year old polio patients than Jewish people.  Had more bomb threats than bat mitzvahs.  And most certainly had no matzo whatsoever.  Which made Passover a living nightmare.  While everyone else unpacked their delicious subs and yeast-infested bagels during lunch, I reluctantly slipped out a measly buttered cracker and acted like it was nothing short of the Norm.  Matzos were not too difficult to get away with. It was Gefilta fish that was the problem.  Once witnessed, the sight of such a slimy gray specimen creatively placed in a transparent Ziploc bag can cause even the most orthodox of all Jews to convert to Buddhism.  Or in my case, eat lunch in the nearest bathroom stall.

 

I wasn’t embarrassed by my religion. Nor was I proud of it.  I just lived through its cookie-cutter stereotypes day after day.  Questioning.  If Jews are so tan, why did I just get mistaken for cauliflower? If Jews drink human blood, why am I sipping Tropicana? If Jews are so filthy rich, why am I not attending some snooty prep school and buying my prissy poodle a new Versace sweater? And, unfortunately, the answers to these questions were not under my supposedly massive nose.

 

One year and a mere three bat mitzvahs later, my family and I made the move from the suburbs of Pennsylvania to Short Hills, New Jersey.  Thirty-seven bat and bar mitzvahs since then, I’ve lived to tell the tale.  But barely.

 

Short Hills/Millburn, New Jersey.

 

If schools were people, Wissahickon would be Courtney Love and Millburn would be a Louis Vuitton suitcase, which costs just about as much as the average human being, anyway.  I mean, if the average human being put his or herself up for sale.  Basically meaning, Short Hills, New Jersey could easily be crowned Unofficial Jewish Capital of the East Coast without even breaking a sweat.  Or a professionally French-manicured fingernail. 

 

With Short Hills came a great variety of changes.  The main one being the drastic alteration in the Jewish population.  Which, from what I hear, is about fifty percent of the entire town.  And although it is still uncommon to find a gefilta fish sliming around in a Ziploc bag, questions such as “Are you Jewish?” have transformed into “Are you not Jewish?” Statements like “I have a big nose,” may be followed by a sincere “Me too.”  And of course, a few of my own personal questions have been answered.  Sort of.

 

“Where are you from?”

“Short Hills.”

“Oh. You mean that mall.  With a few houses surrounding it.”

 

Why are Jews so filthy rich? I have yet to find out.  But I do know that a large number of them are.  And many of them take it out on mink coats, face lifts, and extended family vacations to their own private island(s).  Where they have servants who have servants who in turn have servants working for their servants.  

 

Okay, not all Jews are like that.  I mean, some just spend it all on cars and drugs.

 

Oh.  And for the good of mankind.

 

No, but really.  Not all of them are rolling in Benjamins, or in more common cases, Botox injections.  A lot of us are pretty down to earth.  My family, for example.  Believe it or not, I have never gotten lost in my own house.  I do not have a single maid.  The sight of my nails would cause any manicurist to pay me to never show up at the salon again.  And all my clothes happen to fit in this compact space known as a ‘closet’, rather than an entire separate room. 

 

Now, I must say, I definitely feel much more at home.  Here in Northern Jersey, matzos are abundant.  I’m not the only one that fasts on Yom Kippur.  Obsessing over large noses is but a thing of the past.  And although I am constantly surrounded by aspiring geniuses and snooty millionaires with small nations named after them, I nonetheless try my hardest to remain as close to the ground as humanly possible.  And spend all my college savings on Starbucks frapuccinos at the exact same time. 

 

Bob Caine laughed at his own remark.  And just then, my heart felt as though it had turned to ice.  I stared back into his eyes, and now that I think about it….they weren’t really that green.  In fact, the kid strongly resembled an oversized squirrel. 

 

“Mayseel toz” he said through fits of laughter. But, it sounded more like the chirping of some ignorant woodland creature.  Collin joined in.

 

Yes. Bob Caine was nothing more or less than an anti-Semitic squirrel wannabe.  Who made fun of me, my matzo consuming ways, and my elongated nose for the sake of his own entertainment. 

I stood up and slammed my chair back into the desk. 

 

“It’s Mazel Tov, assholes.” I said just before I walked away.

As odd as it may seem, I tend to think clearer when I'm nearly suffocating from the hazy urge to succumb to the heaviness of my drooping eyelids and lose myself in sleep. When my surroundings are merely a soft blur. Gentle wisps of reality.  Too dreamy to be tangible.  Too fragile to be time.

Heaviness. 

Heaviness that weakens me.  As it presses carefully through my tilted head and seeps into my oddly alert mind. I'm too lazy to smile now.  To rearrange my facial expression like two-dimensional

jigsaw puzzle pieces

that tightly cling to their positions in place with the unwanted acquaintance of consciousness.  And care.

I let my face fall.  Droop.  With my drooping eyelids.  That long to safely shade, conceal, hide my exhausted eyes from the world I witness day after day. 

I'm falling.

But I'm falling under a surreal spell.  A deeply blue haze that blinds me. That caresses me as it pushes me deeper down.  A heaviness. 

And I can't help but think, rather clearly

that maybe this heaviness

is what shields me from the weighty pressure

I'm crushed beneath

day after day.

So school.  Similar to string beans in the sense that you have to accept it as a part of your life no matter how many times you fake sick or say you are 'allergic'. It's a bummer, isn't it? Mom's making your favorite spaghetti and everything's going just splendid and then boom. String beans. Everywhere.  Like they own the place. 

"EAT ME! I have antioxidant phenol compounds!"

Do I know what anti-dioxidant phenol compounds are?  No.  Do I want to know? Not really.  But that's school for you.  String beans.

So, now that I’ve given you my deep introduction to my perspective on my educational career, I am now going to write a brief analysis for each one of my classes.

Eh hem.

What I Am Forced To Sit Through Almost Every Day For Ten Consecutive Months

Health:  I believe I wrote an entire entry dedicated to health way back in the day.  As in November 14th.  As in check it out. 

Health's only okay in my book because it takes absolutely no brain cells whatsoever to pass that class.  Your pastime could be flicking monstrous balls of snot across the room.  Paper airplanes.  Sleeping.  Being as obnoxious as the seahorse in Finding Nemo.  You could smoke marijuana in that class and get twenty extra credit points for 'demonstrating'.  There is just no way to fail Health Class.  One of the few most impossible things in the world. 

Language Arts:  This has and will always be my favorite class.  I love writing.  I love grammar, although I’m not exactly exceptional at it.  And dare I say it, I really don’t mind Shakespeare.  If you happen to be in my Language Arts class and you are reading this, please don’t let my opinion on Shakespeare taint your perception of me.  I would never even consider naming a single one of my children something as ghastly as "Benvolio".  I would not be caught dead in purple tights. And I’ve never once used the word ‘thee’ in a sentence.  Except for just now. And for that one time when I was imitating my sister’s lisp.  But that doesn’t count.  I guess I enjoy Shakespeare for the same reasons any other potential fan might.  The language is beautiful.  And the plots of the plays aren’t too shabby either.  Especially when we aren’t getting tested on them. 

There is, however, a con to my language arts class.  It’s at 8:30 in the morning.  A time when a question like “Where’s your reading log?” could get a response from me along the lines of “Toilet clog? No. That must’ve been someone else.”

Science:  Dr. Citrin is the most unforgiving teacher I ever met.  You forgot your homework?  Left it in your locker?  Guess what? Now Dr. Citrin mentally marked you down in his intangible Book of Student Reputations as a Disorganized Leh-hoo-zeh-her.  Don’t remember what H20 + NaCl is?  Well, I’m sorry to hear that you Hopeless Retardo.  In this class, I’ve learned three major things. 1: Always get the answer right. When someone gets an answer wrong, he usually shakes his head in shame.  As if saying, “Wow, man.  You suck at life. I see a trailer park in your near future.”  2: Be organized.  As in color code everything.  3: Know the periodic table.  He treats each element like they are his un-biologically related children.  If you don’t know the valence state of Francium by now, there is no kind way of putting it.  You are screwed.  Live it, learn it, hate it: The Periodic Table.

Dr. Citrin is also one of those cheesy adults that replace all curse words with different types of food and weapons.  Shit transforms into Sugar.  Son of a Bitch turns into Son of a Gun. Crap changes to Cracker.  And I swear I once heard him replace Oh Fuck with Oh Muffin.

For most teachers, I’d be willing to know what exactly they think of me.  Does she/he think I’m smart?  That I try?  That I’m organized?  I never want to know what Dr. Citrin thinks of me.  It might completely demolish whatever is left of my self esteem. 

Math:  “Thanks, Lauren.  Y-4=4.5(x-56) is correct!  Now, Daryl.  What’s 2+2?” 

Mrs. Noonan clearly thinks I am an idiot.  I don’t blame her, either.  Math is my least favorite subject.  If the world depended solely on my mathematical skills, everyone would die.  I’m just that bad. 

However, Mrs. Noonan isn’t exactly the brightest bulb of the bunch, either.  She once told the class that she originally wanted to be a language arts teacher.  As she wrote the plural form of ‘bus’ as ‘bussses’ on the overhead.  As she typed “Your going to the grocery store” in a word problem.   

Sometimes I brag about being a grammar freak.  Which is pretty embarrassing. Considering the fact that if my grammar skills were a person his name would be Billy Bob, he’d live in the slums of Tennessee, and he’d eat roasted possum for breakfast.  Why? Because I said so.  

But nonetheless, I still feel morally obligated to correct everyone else’s grammatical and spelling errors.

“Thanks, Mrs. Cross.  That is how you spell pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis! Now, Mrs. Noonan.   What’s the first letter of the alphabet?” I wish I could say.  But I refrain. 

History:  It's not the subject that gets to me, it's the teacher.  Not actually the teacher, either.  More like the time and location of where the teacher is.  Because I guarantee you.  Once a single foul word, once the tiniest offending phrase is uttered from my mouth, my history teacher will be right behind me, hearing the entire thing.  I wish I could get away with saying that she merely unintentionally runs into me every time I utter the words ‘shit’, ‘fuck’ ‘bitch’, etc.  However, I am pretty sure someone out there is sending her telepathic messages that help her transport to my exact location.  And then videotape every one of my rude remarks and mail them to God so he can send me to hell.  Early.

Or maybe my luck is just awful.

Techniques of Writing:  I hate it when I feel obligated to laugh at something that really isn’t that funny at all.  This usually happens when a) everyone else is laughing or b) someone tells a joke and no one is laughing and you pity that person. In techniques of writing, it is all about the A.  This class makes my cheek muscles want to file a lawsuit against god-awful jokes and all they stand for.  Oh, great.  Ricky’s giving another one of her ten-hour futile contradictions against society.  Auri is drawing knives on his binder.  And oh no.  Will farted. Let’s all just bust a gut because that is so funny. 

I’m considered the ‘silent one’ of this class.  Everyone else is choking on their own saliva with laughter.  And it makes me wonder.  What is wrong with me?  Why don’t I find nouns hilarious? Why can’t I honestly let out a whole-hearted laugh when Mrs. Thoroman refers to the chewed pencil on her desk as a Christ Figure? Why me? 

However, rather than seeking answers, I resort to my ipod.  Blasting the music and at the same time draining out the laughter that I will never be able to fully join in.

Spanish:  This class is a joke.  Not a funny Ha Ha joke.  A pitiful joke.  When Spanish asks self-consciously why everyone is laughing, the response would be something like “We aren’t laughing with you.  We are laughing at you.” 

Currently, we are learning the conjugation of the AR verbs.   That could be a hard topic.  If I were six.  Everything about this class reminds me of pre-school.  The teacher has an incredibly soft, high voice.  She scolds little Ben Cohen for eating in class.  For moving out of his seat.  She makes us count to ten, slowly.  Recite the alphabet.  I’ve been taking Spanish for three years.  And I just finished learning the alphabet? 

I can’t wait for tomorrow’s lesson.  We’re going on a class trip to Sesame Street.

Art: One word: Therapy.  Behind all those canvases, paintbrushes, and pencil shavings, you will find my barely-there sanity.  Art is living proof that there might just be a god.  It conveniently occurs right after all the horrors of my other classes.  And I can let out all my anger and frustration, or sometimes even, on the rare occasion…happiness, onto my drawing or canvas. And of course, the art posse.  The four somewhat normal freshmen of period eight honors art.  We basically tell each other everything, and although we never actually solve any of our problems, we complain like there is no tomorrow.  I listen to their rambles, I let out my own.  Because that’s just what starving artists do. 

After all that I have track.  Which basically involves skipping track.  Or doing mile repeats.

Wow, do I hate string beans.