I look back on high school sometimes, and I cannot believe the stainless steel balls I had. Not only was I a huge nerd, socially dead to everyone but my fellow beloved band geeks (and yearbook staff! thanks,
I participated in the fundraising venture known as ‘Valet for a Day’ (previously called ‘Slave for a Day’, before my high school went politically correct) and wore wig, grass skirt, tank top covered in whip cream, dog collar, very badly applied makeup and carried a football around in my mouth while walking behind my “master” from first to fifth period. The “cool kids” actually pooled their allowances to buy me, thus the humiliating degradation. And yes, there’s a yearbook photo of me in this get-up. But I did raise a lot of cash for charity!
I performed the role of Lady Olivia in Shakespeare’s play ‘Twelfth Night’, wearing a tight leopard-print dress with handcuffs stuffed down my cleavage (There’s a videotape of this out there somewhere. Scary).
I did a memorized recital of Maya Angelou’s freaking long poem “On the Pulse of Morning” in front of the whole school during a coffee house-style assembly.
And the worst thing I did, which I only remembered this morning while pouring myself coffee in the office kitchenette, was dressing up in a diaper and going onstage with my friends Seth and Alyssa (also in diapers) to perform a 1937 Broadway musical song called ‘Triplets’, written by Arthur Schwartz and Howard Dietz for their musical ‘Between the Devil’. A DIAPER. I’d been listening to a lot of Mandy Patinkin, and he had a recording of it on a CD I owned, so I somehow persuaded my buddies to do this with me. On stage. Before the whole school. I vaguely recall wanting to throw up before we performed, but getting through it anyhow. Some of the lyrics still haunt me:
“We do everything alike / We look alike / We walk alike we talk alike we think alike / And what is more / We hate each other very much / We hate our folks / We’re sick of jokes / And what an art / It is to tell us apart! When one of us gets the measels / The other one gets the measels / Then all of us gets the measels / And mumps! And pox! And croup! / How I wish I had a gun / A little gun / It would be nice to shoot the other two / And be only one!”
Yes, I did just type that out from memory. FROM MEMORY.
High school. Weird stuff happened there, man.
i got nuthin’…
-caellum
Who bought you for Valet for a Day?
Also, why don’t I remember ANY of the performances you listed???
Wait, that’s a lie. I remember Twelfth Night, just precious few specifics.
I was pure geek all through high school, but even i knew better than to get onstage in diapers. it’s worse ’cause you did this in full knowledge of the trauma it’d cause. madness.
i’ve got mental health on speed dial, so you just say the word, okay?
I sang that very same song for a summer musical theatre workshop at some point in high school. I have absolutely no memory of what we wore, though – I think I blocked it out.
you make me feel so much better about the revelation I had two weekends ago that I still know all the words to John Denver’s Calypso thanks to car trips with my dad.
Claris, I don’t believe we’ve met, but let me assure you that there is nothing wrong with knowing John Denver lyrics from car trips with your dad.
Nor is there anything wrong with knowing the lyrics and between-song banter from the entire 2-record “Hot August Night” album by Neil Diamond.
“Tree people out there?…god bless you, I’m singin’ for you too.”
-DL
Jesus Moira,
I forgot about that, rather blocked it out!!
Ps also that wierd jello-sculpter Christie and I made for you,
and the octopussy outfit
I’m not 100% sure who bought me, but the terrible, terrible photo is there in our yearbook for all to see and quail at. Didn’t you TAKE that photo of me?
I think it was Summer Witham’s crew. There was a very effeminate guy named Chris and a tall, skinny brunette who smoked who I could point out if I had a yearbook handy. Some of the sporty football dudes pitched in, too.
And as for remembering the other performances, I certainly wouldn’t blame you if your brain was trying to heal itself by blocking them out.
Ahh, yes, the Octopussy outfit. Mondo ballsy.
However, that was worn in the privacy of Christie’s palatial home, and I was in the company of at least ten other people in matching James Bond garb, so not really anywhere near as embarrassing. Plus, the hand-painted silk robe I made? Was totally cool. Did I wear it out again when we dressed up for the premiere of ‘GoldenEye’ in 1995? I can’t recall. I hope so, because I was 18 and smokin’ hot in 1995. I deserved to wear a silk robe painted with an octopus, cream heels and mostly-see-through bodysuit in public!
Stainless steel balls indeed. I remember your turn as Olivia – my Mom nearly died laughing (in a good way, honey), when you came onstage to `Dreamweaver’. 🙂
I’ve been trying to find a witty way to respond to these memories, but I just can’t find a way that doesn’t make you (and by extension, me) look more geeky. Good times…
C
You know what else we did that was geeky and I kinda miss? Murder mystery games, man. That was the bomb!
I loved getting all costumed up and going over to your parent’s house and eating snack foods and sitting down and trying to get people to divulge clues and then learning the murderer. It was pretty slow-moving entertainment, and frankly I have no clue how we amused ourselves with it stone-cold sober (we make our OWN fun!) but that was a good time.
We should do this again.
Also, I didn’t even MENTION the Star Trek conventions I attended with Alyssa. Now those are some humbling memories to look back on whenever I start thinking I’ve become hot shit. You just can’t get your mogul megalomania on when you know you have a ST:TNG uniform lurking around in your closet somewhere. Unless you’re Napoleon. I bet he could have made that happen.
Reading your post and the responses has been like a trip in a time capsule – how well I remember Twelfth Night and my daughter slithering around the stage like some 1920’s movie vamp, not to mention the Octopussy outfit (I practically had to tie your father down in order for you to be able to leave the house). Still, you haven’t turned out so badly for a sexy nerd…
Hey, man – I have one called `Burritos and Bandidos’ stuck in our games cupboard at home – that’s got potential. I’ll get on it. Anything that involves margaritas *and* intrigue can’t be bad. I did a Shakespeare-themed one of those last year – & let me tell you – still fun (but that’s probably helped by the addition of liquor).
Also, I think all the various uniforms we had to wear for our various band-geek ensembles are a whole chapter of embarassing all to themselves. Purple coat-dresses. Silk shirts (silk button-up blouse = worst. possible. outfit. for Christie). Those terrible purple broomstick shirts.
You know, I think there really is merit to the `brain not fully developed in adolescence’ argument.
C
…that none of the aforementioned stuff was really all that out of the ordinary in the context of our school. Now, I didn’t run with the football crowd either, but unlike your average John Hughes movie, they weren’t the social centre of the school anyway, so their opinions on ‘cool’ weren’t relevant. I treasure the fact that at White Oaks, getting up like a leopard-print-wearing 1970s Shakespearean dominatrix actually counted for cool points.
Man, high school was awesome.
If I knew then what I now know, I would have attended far fewer classes, and humiliated myself vastly more frequently.