High school: two words that can induce panic in even the most well-adjusted professional thirty-something. While preteen experiences are vastly different, I have found that as the years progress and we gain perspective, many of my friends and acquaintances can recall a distinct moment in time that several decades ago changed them immutably. This story represents my own perilous journey into young adulthood.
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I was ill-prepared for high school. With well over four thousand students split between two sprawling campuses each the size of a small university, I was a small ethical speck on an otherwise morally dubious giant fleshy sphere. Skin, bellies and crevices were displayed aggressively. Swear words and a slurs were spoken callously, loudly echoing through the halls. Teachers appeared bedraggled and aged despite having the summer free. Disoriented and wide-eyed I shuffled through the halls wearing tapered jeans, clunky sandals and my father’s socks.
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| FASHION. |
The one bright spot in my pubescent life was had that I had somehow managed to snag a boyfriend (my first) the summer prior. He was a tree-climbing enthusiast with bent wire-rimmed glasses and a voice that had not yet changed. Still, I liked him. He was nice to me and seemed less eager than other boys his age to plunge headlong into a sea of lust. The way we began dating was through a well-known game called Twenty Questions. In my best friend’s living room while sitting cross-legged on brown shag carpeting, it went something like this:
“Do you like me and will you go out with me?”
I uttered a barely audible “Uh, sure…but that’s two questions.”
Thus began my long arduous dating career.
During the first few weeks of 9th grade, I began to find a new confidence (thank you, My So Called Life) and even managed to locate a network of girls with equally saturated moral canvases and the same proclivity toward wearing basketball shorts to school every day. It was these same friends that informed me of my required attendance at the annual homecoming dance. If I was to be serious about dating a boy, my presence would be required.
Everything I knew about dances was derived from Lifetime television movies viewed in health class. I found myself perpetually ruminating about what might take place at this event. There were so many unknowns that plagued my teen-aged brain. My familiar world was slipping from me rapidly.
Surely there would be dancing. I didn’t know how to dance. What about kissing? I didn’t know how to kiss. If so, would I have to utilize my tongue? What about the dress? I lived in mesh shorts and Chicago sports tees. Applying makeup? Yeah right. What would I do with my hair? It was a disastrous mess of curls and remnant mullet. While I floundered, all of the other girls in my class seemed to understand and embrace these foreign concepts. It occurred to me finally that my lack of preparedness was linked directly to my mother. While she taught me how to throw a softball she had neglected to tell me exactly how to be a girl. Nevertheless, I forged onward, driven by the urge to assimilate.
Despite our families’ financial troubles, my mother finally agreed to take me to the mall to select a dress for the event. After an hour of trying on various frocks (all far too expensive) we settled upon a discounted off-the shoulder purple atrocity that made me look like a box. On the front was a drape-like appendage that swayed back and forth. It was hideous. I felt hideous in it.
As homecoming approached rapidly, I became increasingly aware of two especially unsettling truths. Above all, I knew that slow-dancing meant physical contact. How would I be able to manage this when the definition of a slow dance made me uncomfortable? The second, even more troubling reality was that I had no idea how to fast dance. My nightmares progressively worsened, featuring various manifestations of an uncoordinated Courtney Cox in Bruce Springsteen’s “Dancing in the Dark” video. Drenched in sweat, I would coerce my brain back to sleep by imagining myself coyly occupying the space around the punch bowl while I fiddled with my drape and stared aimlessly at the pointy black faux velvet flats (purchased at Payless) that didn’t quite match my dress.
Instead of the crisp fall air I craved, the evening of the dance brought with it stiflingly warm weather for late September in Chicago. This of course added to my discomfort, as I have always been prone to perspiring uncontrollably. With temperatures hovering intolerably around 100 degrees we were driven to the dance by my overprotective father in his non air-conditioned 1936 Ford that he meticulously restored on his own when he was sixteen. The ride was stagnantly silent, pheromones suspended unpleasantly in the humid air as our young eyes feigned interest in the familiar gridded streets. Even after driving needlessly around the city to waste time, my father still managed to drop us off 15 minutes early.
As I opened the car door and stepped into the evening air, the light had all but faded from the sky and I felt light-headed and sweaty. Before I entering the gym my hair-sprayed curls were wet, clinging like jellyfish to my forehead. My hands, clammy and cold felt numb and phantom while my feet, sore in unfamiliar shoes followed the mass of other students floating half-conscious into the gymnasium.
The familiar building had been transformed. What were basketball hoops by day now resembled giant chandeliers. The walls, usually covered with vintage sporting achievements were now concealed with black paper, foil stars and white holiday lights. After weeks of dread and rumination, I finally felt a sense of relief. The darkness was a welcome respite from the feverish outside, and for the first time, I noticed other 9th graders nervously milling about, the girls laughing and giggling about dresses and hair while the boys high-fived one another and yelled obscenities. The bravado and certainty they once possessed had all but evaporated. As the music filled the empty spaces with rich sound, my fears continuing to evaporate. After all, we were in this together. Maybe I wasn’t so different from the rest of my alien classmates. Perhaps I too could finally banish the ghastly images of Courtney Cox and allow myself to shake it in all my boxy wonder.
That is when it happened. And by it, I mean Coolio’s brilliant anthem “Gangsta’s Paradise.” For some odd reason, I loved “Gangsta’s Paradise.” I couldn’t get enough of it. I had memorized all of the words to it and the melody mesmerized me. Never one to immediately dive into something, I decided to play it safe; I’d watch the other kids, see what they did, and proceed with some dancing of my own. Observing said rhythmically gifted kids throw their arms and hands in the air, and kind of move them up and down with the song, I figured that I would follow suit. I closed my eyes again. Before I knew it, my arms were moving up and down and right with the music. I felt like I was floating. I didn’t care that I was hot. Everything was perfect. For a fleeting moment, I was comfortable in my own skin, immersed blissfully in a moment, completely oblivious to the happenings around me.
Suddenly, I was jolted back into reality with a gentle tap on my shoulder. I spun around still mouthing the lyrics, expecting a friend to join me in my reverie.
But it was not my friend. It was my date. His face was contorted, filled with sadness and concern. I slowed my dancing, stopped singing and shouted above the music to ask what was troubling him. He gestured limply with a gangly arm toward the back of the gymnasium. While it was dark, through the flashes of strobe lights I could see the unmistakable outline of my sister. My twin sister. Initially I was unconcerned. She appeared happy, confident, and she too was dancing freely, much like I was. I wiped the sweat from my brow, squinted my eyes and tilted my head sideways to get a better look. It was then that I understood. There she was, moving as if she were sitting up and down in an imaginary chair, her arms directly out in front of her stiff and gawky. I realized that she was leading a large group of other students in watching, mimicking, and mocking me. They giggled cruelly and snickered to themselves, drawing other kids into their group and pointing as if they were watching a circus side show.
That was the end of public dancing for me. To this day, I choose to sit quietly in my chair if I’m at a wedding. At music venues, I might sway side to side casually but beyond that, dancing is out of the question. If I’m somewhere where it might occur, I scoff and scowl, and mutter grumpily, dancing’s for the birds.
