February 10, 2003

just the smell of the summer can make me fall in love

something very odd happened when i was in san francisco.

it all started back in high school, when i started going out with a girl during senior year. as a token "lesbian" couple, we were the recipients of token harassment - graffiti on our lockers, vicious whispers in the hallway, and all the other lovely things that take on the mist of noble misunderstood teenagerhood in weekly television prime time dramas.

one particularly horrific day, Katrina was sitting on my lap at lunch (which ironically enough, was a common practice among all members of my touchy-feely group of friends, romantically linked or not--R.-trina's best friend at the time- and i have been known to drape ourselves all over each other), and boys at the adjacent table occupied themselves with shouting epithets at us over the course of the hour. this table represented the scary death metal alcoholics, who were unfortunately more closely linked with my hippie-druggie-artsy-fartsy-friends than the preppies, white trash, drama nerds, or gangstas across the way. unfortunately we chose to ignore them, so it escalated into the throwing of food at our heads.

being the hippie-druggie-artsy-fartsy lesbian types we were, we chose to seek help from higher powers rather than drag it out to something physical-after-school.

first, we received a lecture from the higher-ups for breaking the school rules against physical touching (even holding hands), despite the publically heavily-petting gangsters in the corner; then, they made us *hide behind a door*, peek out and identify the perpetrators without being seen as they brought them in, charging them with vaguely described crimes, in order to protect us from future retribution.

you can imagine that hiding from the scary death metal alcoholics for our lives was not the most pleasant thing i ever endured in high school.

so the other week when Katrina and i were making plans to meet up for the peace march, she said, "So I met this guy Dave at school and we've been hanging out. You will never believe . . . " (maybe it was aaron. i can't remember his name dammit.) and proceeded to describe how he was one of the guys who threw food at us and called us dyke/dog/bitches that fateful day, and even though she didn't recognize him when they met recently, explained it all to her with heartfelt sorrowful apologies. evidently he also has a crush on her and has been buying her presents. she also noted that though she enjoys his platonic company, she finds it excruciatingly embarrassing in the presence of others, as he tends to be silent with momentary bursts of pedagogic lecturing.

so i met up with them along with others at the peace protest, whereafter we proceeded to Zeitgeist for bier. as we strolled down the street, Jason called my cell phone. I explained to him, "Yeah, we're with this guy who called us dyke bitches and threw food at us in high school!! . . . he seems like a very nice young man," with the customary oxymoronic cheer to which i am wont.

I think this caused young dave to fret and feel untoward. at the bar, he refrained from buying beer, explaining "I drank a lot in high school. those water bottles you always saw us drinking from at lunch. . . were filled with gin. it caused me to do many mean things." then he clammed up and didn't say another word till we left.

anticlimactic i know. it was just a very odd situation.

Written by esther at February 10, 2003 02:59 PM