High School, the Fun Part

”So what’s on?’
         I was lying on a couch in a former hippie’s living room on the north side of Chicago, this former hippie was a friend of mine, Alex Limanowski’s mother.  All considered, this was probably a good thing.  Though she wouldn’t have joined us had she caught us smoking weed in her backyard, all hell wouldn’t have broken loose.
         “Alex there’s a blockbuster around here ya know.  And I hear they have moviefilms there.”
         I often used phrases like ‘moviefilms’ so as to accentuate my downhome sense of humor.  I didn’t really have one of course, I was not southern, or even a baptist.  This irony was really the point of my “joke.” Few understood this, as most people did not grow up on the northside of Chicago in a neighborhood wedged in between the northside and the southside.
         The neighborhood I grew up in was by no means rich, but it was also defenitely not poor.  On the northside people fretted over their scottish terrier getting out and jumping in their pool.  On the southside they had a Chicago park witth a pool, but the 9th street Al Veras dumped a body in their.  We had a Chicago park pool too, somebody just took a shit in it.
         As people from Chicago know there is a racial and economic divide in Chicago.  There is the northside, with it’s Starbuck’s and it’s Old Town School of Folk music.  And the southsode, with it’s, well, they tore down most of the projects, but they didn’t put anything else up.  Maybe all the ghettos in America need to get some Best Buy’s or some Taget’s or something.  I’d say that but Target would just tell the wrecking balls where to go.
         “Nah man, what you got to eat?”  Chimed in Alan, the tall, physically fit one, the one who could win an arm wrestling contest against any of these with one hand tied behind his back.  Well, obviously.
         I had some extra energy, so I figured it would be a good idea to spend it fighting.  So I thought of something stupid to say, then inserted the word “bitch” into it.
         “I dunno goddamnit bitch, we ain’t even smoked yet.”
         Though we would all end the night either drunk or stoned, or of course both,  Andrew insisted on carrying myself with a holier-than-thou attitude, I found it useful.  If everyone was usually wrong anyway, why not assume they’re never right.  I’d be right 97 percent of the time.  Though in reality, people were only wrong 73 percent of the time, it would take me many years to find this.  I still haven’t really found out for sure, he’s getting there though.
         “I know, we just aint gotta get another godddamn movie.  Maybe that’s your problem, ya can’t fuck a dvd.”
         There was an uncomfortable silence for a few seconds.  My sexual experience, or, of course, lack thereof was known to be an off-limits target for light-hearted joking.
         A situation than could have become heated was sedated as it always was by a sharp, or at least cockily delivered comeback comeback.  “I don’t know, you’ve already had your Lord of the Rings DVD’s, but I don’t want to be where you’ve gone, I might track mud all over.”
         This comment was met by a hearty laugh from both Alan and Alex, situation defused.  The laughter continued for a few seconds, after which Alex asked the obvious question.
         “What?’  He said in a voice that hinted at the competing feelings of spite and admiration felt swirling in the pit of his stomach.
         “Shit if I know, you’re the one who laughed.’  This remark was then met with even more laughter, there was even some applause from Ben.
         Ben always applauded this groups comments, regardless of their topic, or target, which was himself more often then not.  Laugh at yourself and the whole world laughs with you.  Noone knew that as surely as Ben did.  Perhaps Kofi Annon, but he did not laugh with the world.  The world did not laugh at this diplomat, and overall king among men.  But they did have to admit, the name Kofi Annon was pretty funny.  Knowing you shouldn’t laugh always makes it that much harder not to.
         So whatever you do, when Kofi Annon Dies, and you are observing a moment of silence.  Do not laugh.  There, now you’re screwed.
         Alex, speaking in the one-track mind all these friends would eventually find themselves in, directed everyone’s thoughts towards the television.
         “Dude!  Sanford n Son on in lke ten minutes anyway.”  Alex said in slightly over-exagerated points of emphasis.  Alex hated missing Sanford and Son.  Especially when there were friends around to jab in the ribs, and laugh mightily with, exclaiming “Red Fox is so clearly drunk off his ass!”
         “Okay, so we watch Sanford N Son, then what?”  Ben said, while his mind didn’t really spend much time thinking about the ‘then.’
         It was interested in ‘now,’ and while there was the cake in the future to be considered, he was more worried about the present.  And during the present, he was watching the pack of magic cards he brought burn a hole in Ales’s table.
         “The cookies be about done now.”  This absence of the word ‘about’ was not meant to bring any meaning to his statement.  It was just another of the lazy habit’s these friends had adopted.  While the difference between the two statements, ‘the cookies should be done about done now,’ and ‘cokies be about done now’ was negligible.  It was enough to notice.
         Even writing this, I noticed the difference enough to waste words on it.  I would have said how many words I’m wasting on it, but I’m far too lazy to count words at 1 in the morning.
         The boys took about fourty minutes to go get the cookies and set them on the table, and enjoy them while laughung heartily at Sanford and Son, especially the fake heart attack.  While some were enjoying it honestly, others were enjoying it ironically.  Neither side really knew whether they were enjoying Red Fox’s performance as a good piece of acting, or a ludicrous, possibly drunken feat.  Either way, it was funny.
         So we sat on the couch and watched Sanford and Son.  At the same time many people were dancing, drinking, and generally having a great time.  Had you asked us why we were not dome of them, the answer would have been obvious to all of us.
         We were tired, and we didn’t wanna dance anyway.
         And we had other things to do.  Things far easier and less tiring.  We had some verbal whipping to give.
         You had Ben, the ‘whipping boy of the group,’ every member of this group had a sharp tongue.  Not a literally ‘sharp’ of course, it’s an expression meaning they were quick with the insults.
         Every time this group got together, someone would go out of their way to call attention to Ben’s rapid premature hair loss.
         ‘Ben, did you forget something today?’  Alex would start a favorite bit of his.  They all knew it wasn’t really funny, but that was the point.  The logic behind this joke, which all in this group subscribed to, went like this.
         If you have a joke, one that you’ve said cuntless times.  Say it one more time, and it will be funny, everyone’s heard it, so many times that the ludricous nature of hearing it again will make them crack up.  Much as they don’t want to, they can’t help it.  But the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and the more determined you are not to laugh, the louder the laughter will be when the dam breaks.
         So as much as everyone wanted the joke to end, it continued when Ben, knowing full well what the answer would be, continued.
         He filled his part correctly as always by simply saying ‘what?’
         ‘Didn’t you forget to get a wig boy!?’  While they all knew this was ny no means a good joke, everyone laughed.  Alan was one of the alpha males of the group, and his joke was aimed at one of the lower-ranking members of the group.  Therefore it was hilarious.
         Things in the world these boys lived in ran in a very specific way.  This worlds hierarchy was determined almost solely on the quickness and sharpness of their tongues.  If you were walking through the hallway and tripped yourself up on your own feet, the game was afoot.
         The first shot could be nasty, in the form of ‘special class is on fourth floor.’  Or, it could not be intended as a shot at all, and simply be fun, ‘yeah, I hate those shoes too.’  In this world, anything could, and therefore should be funny, or it could be hurtful, or, most often it was both.
         It is this sort of interaction that really connects the growing males of my species.  Just like all other wild beasts, human male teenagers must constantly challenge eachother.  These contests are decided in all variety of ways.  The basketball courts, the computer labs, and the english classrooms of the world were constantly alive with such conflict.
         We weren’t tall and athletic, so basketball was right out.  None of us were overly content on computerized violence, and we enjoyed people, so the computer lab was out of the question.  And while we liked english, none of us had yet found the energy or the will to really write.  And we all loved the art inherit in jokes.  Well, not art exactly, bullshit.
         I survived, even thrived in this world.  Looking back at my high school years, the only thing I can say is ‘boy was I a cheeky little badtard.’  However, while being a complete nerd, skinny, pale, short, and nerdy, I could have been torn apart by high school.  But instead, I went into a college preperatory high school populated entirely by nerds.  Nerds I could get together with, get high, and watch Sanford and Son with.  Water finds it’s own level I guess.