Saturday, November 5, 2005

are you there, God? it's me, Dorko or the unbirth of cool When I look at high school-aged girls nowadays, I think three things: Dude, they look as old as I do. Please put your ass back in your pants. Thank heavens I'm not in high school anymore. Eh, but it wasn't as bad as all that. I simply took the road less travelled, and that, in addition to making all the difference, made me appear to be a bit... odd. Not that there is anything wrong with odd, though... no way. It's just that it wasn't necessarily the best way to approach the one period of my life where my reputation lived and died according to my surplus of cool. I generally had just enough "cool" to fit on the head of a pin. That being said, I don't really care who thought I was cool in high school. I wasn't really all that ostentatiously fabaulous, but I did my thing, I had fun, and -- this is probably the reality of which I am the most proud -- I didn't hurt anyone in the midst of making my way towards adulthood. The "coolest" people I knew in my high school -- the ones who held the rhinestone crowns awarded at the end of dances, who had the clearest skin, who possessed the most public sway and the most dangerously loyal coterie of syncophants -- couldn't always say the same. Nor would they likely care to. Still, I was a dork. I can acknowledge this. What dimensions did my dorkitude take, you ask? Gather round, little ones. Let Auntie Meg tell you how they rocked it in 1992. I was in the "nerd" classes, but this wasn't actually an impediment to cool in my high school. In fact, in a weird anomaly to everything else that was valued and prized within our hallowed halls, the most popular people actually were in the Advanced Placement and Enriched (like whole wheat flour?) courses along with us dorks. It's just that while us dorks were drawing intricate reenactments of major WW II battles using stick figures in the side margins of our pages and writing spontaneous poetry about animals with funny names (wallabies, platypuses, gila monsters), they were staying on topic and focusing on the minimum required to get the maximum grade. It's true: we excelled at nerdhood even in places where nerdhood was the anticipated norm. We took it -- in the parlance of ESPN telecasts -- to the next level. But I was not restricted to geekhood in nerdy environs, oh no. I was placed in a remedial math course in the 11th grade. This was not nerdy -- more just lame. But somehow, I managed to be a nerd within the ultimate non-nerd scene. Everyone else in my class was a guy, save for the one girl next to me who was, like myself, a non-math-oriented literature and history and art freak. These boys ruled the woodshop and the metalshop and PhysEd and excelled at anything they actually enjoyed doing. And I'm quite sure that they had brains that were perfectly capable of doing math. They just didn't give a rat's ass about school or teacherly expectations or impressing anyone but their slightly dubious girlfriends. They were cool. I did give a rat's ass. I just sucked really badly at calculus. But I did the normal nerd thing -- I expressed an exciteable desire to learn and get things right... not something a remedial math instructor is used to. Which meant, essentially, that our teacher fell in love with me and the other girl in the class and grinned ecstatically at our raised hands and considerate questions. I know, I know... ewwww. The guys would alternately hit on us for lack of other objects or mock the life out of us for being such keeners, but they soon realized why nerds are successful the world over: we parlayed our teacher's affection into hall passes and jaunts to 7-11 to buy Slurpees for the whole group... not to mention the ability to skip class without repercussions, as long as we were enthused when we actually showed up. I passed the course. Just barely. But my teacher wrote in my yearbook that Erin and I were his favourite students ever. Sigh. I was also known (shock of shocks!) as a bit of a klutz in high school, as was evidenced by my notable fall down the senior stairs, my ability to clothesline myself on the volleyball net during practices, and my legendary and catastrophic tumble from the school roof into a large bush. Klutziness is cute in Meg Ryan and Drew Barrymore. They look adorable with an ice pack pressed against an artful booboo on their forehead. My foibles would result in something more akin to a sucking chest wound. It's hard to hold hands with boys when your fingers are in splints or to neck when your neck is protected by a large foam brace because you gave yourself whiplash sliding down an icy driveway. This I can say from experience. People who are physical ticking time bombs are not generally seen as cool. We are seen as freaks of nature. And if the X-Man comics have taught us anything at all, it's that we are not destined to be homecoming queens, but rather superheroes pursued by corrupt government figures and villains wanting to use us to attain total world domination. Except that didn't happen to me. I was pursued by a swarm of bees once, however. As far as appearances went -- because one needs clothing to cover the bruises inflicted by field hockey sticks and science projects (don't ask) -- I didn't dress like a dork, per se. I just couldn't bring myself to wear acid wash or slouch socks or hair that exceeded acceptable limits within building codes -- things that were de rigueur at the time in my school. And I was a pain in the ass to my parents; I refused to shop within the smallish city in which we lived, choosing instead to pine for items purchased in Vancouver, over an hour away. I liked khakis and cable knit sweaters and Weejuns and wore my hair stick-straight, with bangs. Everyone else looked like an extra from a Whitesnake video. I was a pocket tee amidst bustiers. A J. Crew catalogue in a stack of Tiger Beats. A multigrain bagel in a sea of eclairs. I'd like to think I was tasteful, but I was probably just dull. My grad dance looked like a Gay Pride flag -- all the colours of the rainbow (and some not found in nature) made their way out onto the floor. I, however, wore an elegant off-the-shoulder black number that my mother made with excrutiating detail and care. This is a dress that Liz Taylor would have been proud to wear before she started hanging out with Michael Jackson and collecting ailments like Hummel figurines. But my mother was also contracted to make a dress -- from a picture in a magazine, no less -- for one of my friends. This dress contained all of the following: sequins beading purple velvet white satin an asymmetrical hemline a dropped waist puffy sleeves It was truly the sum of its parts. That is all that can be said about that. My oatmealish taste in fashion was probably reflective of my taste in other areas of life, too. We were a Heavy Metal Parking Lot if ever any school was, but I was into jazz. Coltrane instead of Judas Priest. Mingus over Metallica. Okay, okay, and some inane pop. And some depressing neo-folk. But not metal. While I know the words to much of what Poison, Motley Crue and Skid Row released during that period strictly as a result of immersion (I can recall losing a portion of my ear drum to 'Every Rose Has Its Thorn' during a drive to MacDonalds one lunch hour), I don't think I ever chose to put the stuff on in the privacy of my own home. My brother, however, liked some of the less soft metal... but I would slam my door if he cranked it. My taste is much harder and darker now (as is my heart), but then I was a bit of a pansy back then... ...aka dork. While I know that "cool" now has a bad name in certain segments of the population because of the arbitrary nature of the designation (although we still use it all the time without thinking) and "nerds" developed hipster cachet by the bucketful ages back (although conveniently, not in my town), I still look back at my high school years and cringe a little at my inability to not stick out like a (jammed by a basketball in gym class) sore thumb. But it made me the girl I am today: an accident-prone keener in neutrals who writes poems about bok choy while making noises like a squeak toy trapped in a Nautilus machine. Would you love me any other way? Maybe. This is Meg, though. And honey? A dork by any other name would not smell as sweet. 5:03:38 PM    well, yes, but...  [] drip. drip. drip. drip. It's still raining. I still haven't bought another umbrella. I'm not sure why not; it could be stubbornness in the face of injustice, blind optimism that this downpour will cease... or perhaps just laziness. Regardless, I am back here today, sitting at the scene of the crime (the ill-fated coffee shop) and, while it has cleared up momentarily on and off since then, we are still very much in the throes of a wet Vancouver autumn. Which means I should really buy another umbrella. Those of you who are currently looking out your windows to a sunny day... those of you who saw stars in a clear sky last night... those of you whose hair does not form an abstract curlicue sculpture every time you leave your home... those of you who can wear white clothing without fear of pending transparency.... Well, you suck. I left my apartment in my brokedown old Gore-Tex and heard the rain falling before I even opened the door. I'm not sure, at this point, why I still bother to moan about the weather, given the prevalence of precipitation in my area. I mean, hello -- we live in Vancouver. They call it the Wet Coast. All the publications that tout the city as a magical place to live always include a mention of the rain as a caveat in their otherwise glowing descriptions. It's damp and it's not going to change. But for some reason, we manage to find the audacity to enjoy our green grass, our clean streets and our lush forests, and yet still whine about the way our shoes disintegrate in the puddles. And that -- more than any other single attribute -- is what defines us and bonds us as a community. United we bitch, divided we move to Calgary. You can tell a native West Coaster anywhere you go by listening for two statements in their conversational flow: "Oh, I totally miss Vancouver. I swear, it's the best city on earth." "Rain? Ha. You don't know rain. This isn't rain. This is like... mist." (this spoken in the midst of a monsoon) Yeah -- I love where I live. Yeah -- the rain drives me bonkers. And yeah -- I realize that the rest of the world gets tired of hearing about it, especially since where I live is so damn pretty. I guarantee you though, if you move here, you'll be spouting off about the weather in no time -- right around the moment you realize you never ever want to leave. 1:02:53 PM    well, yes, but...  [] hello goodbye In a week, my roommate Kristy is moving to another city. Tonight, we had a girls' dinner out at a trendy restaurant Kris had always wanted to try out and then headed to another spot where the husbands and boyfriends joined us for dessert (unless we had none... dessert OR boyfriends... but that's only Kristy and I). We have friends there -- in her new location -- who will be great company and support for her during the big changes she'll face. And I'll still be living down here with her lovely and fabulous twin, actually, so I'm sure we'll head up to visit fairly often and lend support of our own. It's still a big shake-up for all of us, though; we need to find someone to plug into her spot in our home, while she'll be adjusting to a whole new world. But I'm excited to see where life will take her. Tonight was an intimate gathering of close friends -- just the thing to commemorate the thoughtful difference she has made in all of our lives. And she has made a difference, without a doubt. She is one of my best friends in the world. She challenges me, pushes me, loves me, laughs with me, and makes me feel like anything is possible in my life. She gives me trust, affection, advice, and grace. I'm honoured to have a confidante and support like Kristy. It's hard to see you go, girl, but we have a whole lifetime ahead of us in which to hang out! Here's to Car Fu, top-of-the-lungs singing, strange diets, coffee shop marathons, makeovers, yelling at the hockey game, venting about idiotic boys, and bringing out the best in one another. Don't even think for a second you won't be missed. I can already identify the genesis of a Kristy-shaped gap. Make sure you come back and fill it now and then. 12:58:01 AM    well, yes, but...  []

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