That first weekend is still kind of a blur. Drinking, making out. How I got from one place to another, whose house we were at, how I got home: I have no idea. Even at the time I was in a haze. But over the next week we began talking more and more: on the phone, at school. I remember kissing in the hallway in front of everybody between classes. If anyone hadn’t heard the news by then they knew now. I think we both relished the thought that we were the talk of the school. We were an unlikely couple, and we were both well-known. It had everyone speculating. Our friends congratulated us.
The surprise for me was the nature of our private conversations. Shelly was brilliant and articulate. Whereas I didn’t even last one year in Catholic school (see the thread “From Boom to Bust”) she had thrived there. She was a great student and the nuns loved her. She loved being Catholic and was fascinated by all the theological and ritualistic aspects. She sang in the church choir and relished the music. As you may recall, by that point in my life I had become an atheist and felt completely alienated from my Catholic roots. She had taken an additional middle name at confirmation and now her initials were SASS. I kid you not. Shelly was athletic. She played field hockey and swam. She was adventurous and assertive, and when she played field hockey it was “banzai!!” as she rushed into the middle of the action. She worked after school, reading for a blind woman and assisting her with her personal and professional paperwork. She had been saving money all through high school and planned to backpack through Europe alone during the summer after graduation. She had her airline tickets, passport, and Eu-rail pass all ready to go two months early. In the fall she was entering UCLA. I learned all this very quickly.
In the process, I picked up on the fact that her energy and quick wit masked a great deal of anxiety. She worried about everything, all the time. She was actually quite insecure. Her way of dealing with fear was to just go balls-to-the-walls all the time. She told me she had trouble sleeping, for years. It’s possible that the only time she relaxed at all was when she was drinking. This explained a lot.
Our make-out sessions were passionate and intense, but even a week in we were fully clothed. It was just kissing and hugging. Whenever my hands would wander anywhere on her body I could feel the anxiety flow there. Touch is my “element.” When I touch anyone, I feel things inside the body. Like a sixth sense, I “see” what’s going on with the person. Many years later this natural gift made me a very successful massage therapist. At the time I didn’t reflect on it at all, I just knew what I knew. But I could tell something was up with her. We got to talking about it.
Turns out kissing and hugging is all she had ever done with a guy. The rumors about her being a “huge slut” were based on the fact that she had made out with a lot of guys at parties, but she told me she had never had a boyfriend and had never done anything sexual with anyone. In fact, she said, “I’m actually terrified of men.” The reputation was a cover, a magic spell to ward people off. I smiled, laughed, and said, “I get it.”
She then told me about her night terrors. I asked, “What is it you are afraid of?” She said, “I wake up in the middle of the night terrified that I am going to die unexpectedly.” I said I thought that was strange for a person so young, and she replied, “It started when I was eight.” That intrigued me, so I asked more questions. She said, “Well, there was this older man who lived alone in our neighborhood, retired. He had a nice house and a swimming pool, and all summer long all the girls from the neighborhood would hang out there all day. Our parents were fine with it. He was really nice and didn’t mind. We had a lot of fun there. But then one night he died unexpectedly in his sleep. That’s when I began to wake up in the middle of the night afraid that God would take me too. I would run to my parents’ room and climb into bed with them — that’s the only way I could sleep. Until one day Dad said I was too big to sleep with them anymore, and since then nights have been dark, cold, and lonely.”
As this story sank in I had one more question. “Did anything weird or inappropriate happen with the neighbor?” I asked. “Not that I can remember…” she trailed off. “But of all the girls that hung out at his house, I think I had the most close and special relationship with him.” I took a deep breath and decided to leave it there.
It turns out that I was the first guy she ever felt safe with. There was something about the way I listened, the way I touched her, and the way I articulated my own emotions that put her at ease in my presence. And now I understood that fate had brought us together so we could walk through our anxieties together. I sensed that we stood at a threshold.
Returning to that first fateful night after the show: the next thing I remember after making out in the bathrooms is riding in the back of someone’s car. Shelly and I continued to kiss and hug. I was surprised by the thickness of her waist and the way my hands and arms sank into her when I squeezed, but I liked it. She was a very good kisser. We weren’t saying much, as I was still pretty roasted. The next thing I remember was rolling around on a bed in a back room at some house I had never been to, fully clothed, but very wrapped up in each other. We started talking, although I have no idea what about.
The next night, Saturday, I was aglow with anticipation of another party that she had planned with her closest friends. I remember arriving together and being greeted with inquisitive looks. As soon as I got there someone handed me a beer. There were a lot of people, although the house was small. I was introduced to several people whose names I already knew and who probably already knew mine, but the formality of it cemented the fact that I was with her. And that turned out to be a very big deal. She knew virtually everybody at our school (her father still taught there — more about that later) and she seemed to have many friends. Suddenly I found myself conversing with a bunch of seniors — well-known popular people — and they were curious about me.
I had walked in the door shy and inhibited. One or two beers later a complete transformation occurred. I vaguely knew that one of the signs of alcoholism is a radical change in personality when drinking, but I wasn’t reflecting on it at the time. What I felt was the crushing weight of self-conscious inhibition that had tormented me since being assaulted by Walt was suddenly lifted. I was free: unafraid and exuberant to be the person I had been in sixth grade. I was funny. I was zany. I found I could converse with people, and I loved to hear one after another say, “Wow, I had no idea you were such a fun/interesting person!” It was amazing. Obviously, I wanted more. I also experienced a curious craving for more beer. It was the first time (but not, certainly, the last) that I found myself drinking uncontrollably until there was no more to be had. This became the pattern for how I behaved at high school parties from then on. I realized that being with Shelly was like having a key to the center of the social scene of the drama crowd. It was amazing.
It was the morning after this party that my mom got the phone call. As we puzzled over Cleo’s dire warnings my mom asked me where I thought this might be going. I told her we had simply made out a couple of times, it was casual and I had no reason to think it would lead to anything serious. My mom expressed some concern that Shelly was older than me and already eighteen. I said I knew what I was doing and would be fine. (I didn’t and I wouldn’t, as you will see.)
A couple days later I found myself riding in a car with a guy named Tom. He was a very prominent senior in the drama crowd, sort of the male equivalent of Shelly in terms of his knowledge and influence. Don’t ask me how I got there, he was just giving me a ride to another party or something. It was the first time we had ever spoken, and I will never forget the things he said. He seemed to know Shelly very well, and commented that people thought us getting together was very odd. He said, “Everyone thinks it will last three weeks, tops.” Clearly we were the subject of much gossip and speculation and that thrilled me. He said, “You’re new to the party scene, aren’t you?” I affirmed that and added, “I really don’t have any experience with women, either.” He turned to me and said, “Well, stick with Shelly and you will get very experienced very fast.” So that was the gig: I would be her plaything for a couple of weeks and finally get my wings. I didn’t mind the thought.
It turns out that Tom didn’t know Shelly as well as he thought he did.
I realize that the last two posts made me look pretty gay. While I proudly claim the label “queer” for myself, I have sometimes been told that bisexuals don’t really exist. Contrary to popular opinion and some very flawed studies, bisexuals are real. I have debated about telling the following stories, but I feel that it is necessary to set the stage for the following post (A Dark Winter). Alcoholism involves a physical addiction but is often fueled by emotional and spiritual deficits. To recover I had to come to recognize that I was “soul sick.” My soul sickness began before my addiction developed. Even after I knew it was bad for me I continued to drink because it was the only medicine I had that assuaged the deep anguish I felt. Now I will place myself on the autopsy table for a forensic investigation into some of the underlying conditions that amplified my disease. I hope my honesty makes up for the bad impressions you will get from my behavior.
When I was in sixth grade I was pretty uninhibited, often playing the role of clown in class, and very active on the playground. I teased and flirted with the most popular girls in class because I didn’t see why not: I was a boss. I remember hanging out with Lisa and Katie at Lisa’s house on a few afternoons. There was quite a bit of off-color humor, as you would expect with eleven-year-olds. That year for Halloween our town put on a haunted house. There was this old mansion on the edge of town that was in the process of being restored by the historical society. It was made available for the purpose and I suppose a lot of work was put into it. These days it’s not unusual for organizations to put together such things, but at the time it was very new. Everyone was excited to go, and a group of us including some of my siblings went together. I clearly remember going through the first two rooms, the horror displays, the jump scares, the arms reaching out from hidden places to grab at you as you passed. At a certain point something weird happened in my brain. I remember feeling disoriented and dissociated. Suddenly my legs were moving in a new direction without any accompanying thought. I suppose my prefrontal cortex switched off and the animal parts of my brain took over. I somehow got past the workers who were shouting, “Hey, kid, you can’t go that way!” and evaded capture. In serpentine fashion I darted across three rooms and found an exit. Once out in the safety of the cool night air I took a deep breath, relishing my return to consciousness. When my group came out a few minutes later they were saying, “Where were you? We lost track of you and didn’t know what happened.” I was ashamed of the fact that I had panicked, but was also a little bit proud of my daring escape. Their security was weak. Perhaps they didn’t anticipate any of their victims making a break for it.
Over the summer leading into seventh grade I got a girlfriend, Kelly. It began with playground flirtation. I remember being at my dad’s house for a couple weeks after that and thinking of her obsessively. I was lost in fantasy and imagined her thinking of me too. I sensed the potential of — what? I didn’t even know. But when I got back in town, saw her again, and learned that indeed she had been thinking of me the whole time I was gone it was pure elation. This was my first experience of someone I really liked liking me back. That Fall we were “boyfriend and girlfriend,” which really meant that we continued to spend time goofing off on the playground at her condominium complex and talking a lot. I believe we spoke on the phone as well. One day in October she said to me, “Come over here, there is something I want to give you.” We went away from the playground to another courtyard in the complex. “What?” I asked. “Come over here,” she said, leading me into a recessed doorway. I stood with my back against someone’s door as she turned. Smiling, she placed a hand on each of my shoulders. “Close your eyes.” I did, still clueless. All at once I was awash in the sweetest sensation: her soft lips planting one careful kiss on mine. I was overwhelmed. I did not reciprocate, but I could think of very little else for the next few days. But I guess with what was going on at home I somehow couldn’t go any further with her and I cut things off suddenly. For decades I regretted the hurt and confusion she must have felt at me breaking up with her for no apparent reason, but it was a bit like my escape from the haunted house. I couldn’t have told you why I did it. After that I became increasingly shy and inhibited about my crushes.
One of the themes of this blog, a main theme actually, is the dangerous destructive potential of low self-esteem. I think my parents were misguided on this subject. Perhaps as a mix of Catholicism and Twelve-step ideas, I was taught that pride was a sin, humility a virtue, and that “ego deflation at depth” was good spiritual medicine. Whenever my parents perceived that I was getting “too full of myself” they would tear me down verbally. Of course, with Walt it was physical too. Today I understand that self-esteem is different than pride. “Pride” exists as a poor substitute for self-esteem, often activated in response to accusations or insults. It’s natural. Being called “queer” in a derogatory context made me militant in my denials. I finally developed some real self-esteem in my fifties, thanks to going back and finishing my undergraduate degree, and also meeting the love of my life during that time. Her humorous yet loving acceptance of my foibles has helped me to accept that, while utterly unique and weird, I am just like everybody else in that I deserve love and happiness just by virtue of the fact that I exist. I don’t have to “earn” it — it’s a birthright. That, my friends, is self-esteem. My parents weren’t given anything approaching unconditional love growing up. They worked hard to prove that they were of value in the world, but somehow never seemed to really believe they had succeeded. As a result they were very good people, but deeply insecure nevertheless. In my teen years I was plagued by the same sense of inadequacy and it permeated my awkward attempts to gain notoriety through my musical activities.
On with the next story! I met Tana when I was in tenth grade (she was a year older). I sat next to her in marching band class as she played tenor sax and I played baritone sax. Tana was very intelligent and we joked around a lot. She was unusually close to her mom and was active in her church. She was tall and thin, and to be honest, I didn’t find her physically attractive at all. But I loved our friendly banter and I relished how our friendship grew over that year. Enter Trisha. The first Star Wars movie was released over the following summer and made quite an impact. The fact that the music stood out enough to make the album a hit made it all the more popular with us band nerds. That Fall (now I was in eleventh grade) a new girl showed up in band playing French horn. She had recently moved up from L.A., had tacky dyed blonde hair, a curvy body and a cute face. Most sensationally, she had a bubbly-yet-nerdy personality that made her the focus of attention for me and my male friends. We couldn’t get enough of her! I had seen Star Wars in the theater once or twice. She told us she had seen it a dozen times and she knew people in L.A. who had over a hundred viewings under their belts. She talked a lot about how amazing L.A. was, and hungrily soaked up all the attention she was getting. In a small town she was suddenly a big fish.
After seventh grade my “romantic life” had devolved into fantasy-driven, super-secret, excruciating crushes from a distance. With the girls I was friends with I could joke around easily, but when I developed a crush on someone I became quite shy. Trish was a little different because we were part of a friend group (comprised of her and a bunch of guys who lusted after her), so while my crush was secret (barely, I guess), I was able to be my usual boisterous self. We all had a lot of fun that fall. The marching band had been fundraising for a year to make a trip to the Mother Goose Day Parade in El Cajon, down in San Diego County. That meant travelling by air, which I had never done. The parade was scheduled for the Sunday before Thanksgiving. We were playing “Ease On Down the Road” from The Wiz, and the band director’s concept was for us to come to attention, play about eight bars of “Over the Rainbow” while standing still, then start marching to the upbeat popular song from The Wiz. Cool! But we didn’t have an arrangement of Over the Rainbow. The director asked me if I could take this piano arrangement by George Shearing and score it for marching band, writing out all the parts. I could do that! I gained even more notoriety from that accomplishment, as not too many high school juniors could have done it without help. My “ego” was growing.
I hadn’t had anything to drink since the infamous champagne incident before ninth grade, but some of the guys I knew from Jazz Ensemble were partiers. They invited me to go for a drive with them one evening and we cruised Main Street, drank beer, and smoked a joint. I was not used to this form of male companionship. They asked me if I liked any girls (no doubt they had heard the rumors about me liking boys). I said, “Yeah, I think Trisha is really hot.” They started shouting things like, “Yeah! You should bone her!” I was pretty uncomfortable with that attitude, as I already knew her well enough to know she was not that type, appearances perhaps to the contrary. She had quietly admitted to me that she had no sexual experience. But I felt the peer pressure to make some kind of move in her direction. As the trip to San Diego neared, I somehow mustered the courage to call her. I told her I really liked her, thought we would be good together, and asked her if she wanted to hang out with me at the San Diego Zoo, which was planned as part of the trip. She said yes! I was euphoric for about three days as I kept our arrangement secret from the rest of the guys. I was lost in a world of fantasy that included walking around holding hands, maybe sneaking a kiss in front of the giraffes. The night before we were to leave on the trip I received a phone call. She said she was worried that maybe I wanted to go off alone with her, which would probably alienate the other guys and mess up the friend group dynamic. I learned she had actually been a chubby misfit in L.A., had lost weight and dyed her hair over the summer, and was making a new start of things. She told me she had worked hard to develop an outgoing personality and to build up a social circle and didn’t want to ruin it. It really felt like she was confiding in me, which I should have appreciated more than I did.
If I could travel back in time as my sixty-two-year-old self and talk to sixteen-year-old me I would say, “Dude, you got this. She likes you. She wants to go out with you, but she doesn’t want to ruin the trip for the other guys and destroy what she has built. She’s opening up to you. Just play it cool on the trip knowing that you are going to start dating afterwards. Make a plan to go see a movie with her.” But I was an insecure dork, and I felt myself spiraling into despair. I told her I understood, but once on the airplane I couldn’t bring myself to try to sit near her or speak to her, even. I sulked the whole way. She seemed hurt and confused. My mom would have derisively told me to get off my pity pot. Ugh. The trip turned out to be very fun anyway, but I just couldn’t get past the feeling that I was not good enough for her. On the flight back I sat next to Tana. We had been good friends for over a year but she knew nothing about my failed attempt to get something started with Trisha. After take-off I suddenly, without really thinking about it, put my arm around her. She accepted it, and we sort of cuddled the whole way back. I was weirdly gratified when I saw that Trisha had noticed us before quickly turning away. Revenge? What a dick, though. Arriving back in town, Tana took me aside and said that us being a thing was probably a bad idea. She was right, but it was a second blow to my pride.
I never apologized to either of them. The common denominator in all of these stories is that under certain stressful circumstances I would act or react in ways I couldn’t control or even explain. Apologizing or salvaging the situation in some graceful way was simply not within my capabilities at the time. Not long after that weekend Tana’s mother died suddenly. I’m sure it turned her whole world upside down. The following semester she was like a different person: she had ditched the horn-rimmed glasses for contacts, lightened and styled her hair, wore make-up, and now had a stylish wardrobe. Soon she was dating one of the most popular guys in the senior class and became part of the “in” crowd, partying a lot. We never really spoke again.
As for Trisha, our friendship was rekindled when I helped her rehearse a number to audition for the Spring musical. Judging from what she wrote in my yearbook the following year we must have become good friends by the time I graduated, but I am sure the San Diego incident was never mentioned again.
kirkwise 