The Chains That Seperate The Men From The Boys

I spent every lunch hour in middle school at the plaza "illegally". I had to wait for the lunch lady who side lined as a 'Brick' Commercial star to make her way out to pasture so I could step over the chain link and scurry to the KFC. Not that I'd ever buy any. I was just too cool to hang out with the hyenas and the nintendbimbos. The walking in a 10 man parallel line or circular multi-faced amoeba was nauseating to me. I prefered liming at the plaza solo and exchanging flirty remarks with Joey from the neighbouring highschool because Joey's brother, who was my age, hated it.

I was cool. I got invited to every one of the hyena and nintendbimbo parties. As much as they usually despised me, they never left me out. And I went, spending the night slow dancing with one of Mikey's friends -the only outsiders to our upper middle class french immersion school mixed parties. Looking back, I should have paid more attention to Mikey himself - did he ever turn out fi-i-ine!

But here's the thing, because I believed myself so hardcore and managed to make the cool crowd believe it too, I was able to keep the nerdiest kids close without their nerd factor actually rubbing off. Sweet little rat face, two years my junior, who brought me a bag of batteries for my walkman just because I was nice to him. Adorable David from the "retard" class who would run and hug me when we passed in the yard. Losers from my own year, whose full names I remember with total clarity- Dhooki, Roopnarine, Buttersingkorn, Ostrovski- because I took the time to acknowledge them. Yes, anyone uncool, I treated with great sensitivity.

The cool ones well, I was not so kind. I threw poutine at Kristy in the public transport bus, I had the morning t.v. news zoom in on a picture of Lauren and referred to her as a "canine familiaris". I flirted with their boyfriends, I was insulting and condescending and basically treated them with a carefree contempt. I was a cool kid terrorist.

It seems to me that as we've aged, the nerds have turned out super cool and the cool ones not so much. It certainly explains why I liked the nerds then and why I don't much like the nerds now. Here I am going on 30 and I'm still so much a loner stepping over the chains that seperate the men from the boys...

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