Monday, November 12, 2007

Redemption and Vindication

A week or so ago, I published some photos from The Gold Mine From Whence All Stories Shall Emerge Hanceforth. The photos were from my junior high yearbook and I promised I’d be posting more photos every Sunday during the month of November.

Yeah, that didn’t happen.

Real life got in the way, and by real life, I mean painting, repainting, going to Home Depot 43 times and then proceeding to do some more painting. All that painting got in the way.

Anyway, I also promised the story of Greg Francisco and his evil ways from when I was a wee lad. Here it is. Junior High Photo Phun later this week!

I first “met” Greg when we were both in 7th grade. Couple things to remember: I was the prototype for “late bloomer” so I was terribly short, skinny and small. Seriously, people stepped on me and the time just walking to and from classes. I didn’t start growing until I was a sophomore and almost 16. Sadly, that must be some kind of dominant gene in our pool, because our 13 year old is a skinny, if adorable shrimp. Luckily, he’s a bit more well put together mentally than I was. Also, I was not only new at the school, but it was also junior high, and having to move from classroom to classroom gave me the willies. Weird, I know, but let’s remember that I was also afraid that vampires would be sweeping into my bedroom at night; I was basically made out of neuroses and random fears, so being apprehensive about junior high went with the territory.

At the time, Greg was one of those people who could sense fear and crisis in others and use that to his advantage. He bullied me. Teased me. Threatened me with physical violence. Occasionally punched me HARD in the arm when no one was looking. “Borrowed” my lunch money from me with no intention of paying me back.

Yes, that’s not just a clever and well worn cliché. Bastard really did steal my lunch money.

I did my best to avoid confrontation with him. I parked my bike away from him. I tried to sit far away him in classes we shared. We lived somewhat close to each other and I’d either ride as fast as I could to get ahead or slow way the hell down to keep my distance.

Really, I lived in fear of him.

Every. Day.

The one time of day when I couldn’t avoid him was in jazz band. I played tenor sax and sat “first chair.” He played alto and sat “second chair.” Though even if he had sat first chair alto, I’d still have been sitting next to him. Every day I hoped he’d be sick or decide to quit band and take up torturing puppies full time.

That he sat second chair alto was a source of great disappointment to him. Greg was a naturally competitive person and being second chair to anyone didn’t sit well with him (or, if I could just get psychoanalytical here for a moment, it probably didn’t sit well with his over-bearing, un-loving and emotionally distant father, but I’m just projecting; I have zero clue as to his childhood or parental situation). Sitting first chair alto was my friend Greg Blake, who was a great kid, and was good enough that he almost always sat first chair.

The whole “first chair/second chair” thing was a competitive affair. You tried out and got seated according to skills, etc. You could challenge the person above you a couple times a year. G. Francisco usually lost those challenges to G. Blake, much to my secret delight at the time.

I sat first chair tenor say, not because of my mad musical skillz, certainly, but because there was dearth of decent players at the school who’d be willing to lug around a tenor sax. And really, the thing was comically large for my small frame. It was HELL to strap on to my bike, too. Ugh. The guy who played second tenor was really not a good player at all. So I never got challenged.

Until Greg Francisco decided in eighth grade that he’d had enough of hanging out in Greg Blake’s shadow and I would be easy pickings. So he talked the band director into letting him switch from alto to tenor and he moved further into my life.

Well, that just sucked to high heaven, let me tell you. The only good thing was that he didn’t have to sit RIGHT NEXT to me while he played second tenor. But after rehearsal every day as we left the bad hall, I got to hear all about how he was going to kick my ass when the next challenge round came up. SO MUCH FUN FOR ME!

Naturally, mere seconds after Mr. Hall, the band director announced that challenges were open, Greg marched up and wrote his name down on the board. Predictable, though annoying and made me get all nauseous and want to use the bell of my sax to catch the inevitable puke.

A couple weeks passed and I don’t think I’ve ever practiced or worked so hard for something in my life. I lugged that damn sax home every day and practiced my scales and the pieces and the solos like my life depended on it. Which to my junior high mind, it did.

Judgment day came and to my astonished self, I won! I kept my chair and Greg F. had to stay in second chair for the rest of the year. (Only a couple months, but still!) The only problem was that not only did he have the “shame” of being second chair, he also had to play the second chair tenor sax part, which let’s be honest here, sucks. You don’t get any solos, everything you do is harmony and you are essentially playing the part of a reeded trombone. And we all know how weird and goofy trombone players are.

Not good.

So Greg was a mass of seething resentment for the duration of the school year, which had not occurred to me as a possibility. Somehow I just thought, “Hey, I won! All my troubles are over! Let’s go play Dungeons and Dragons ALL weekend! I’ll bring the Doritos!” No, lived in fear the remainder of the year, since he blamed me for his failure to ascend to first chair.

Fast forward to the next year, we are both freshmen in ninth grade. I don’t have any classes with him and he’s given up band, so my life has gotten much better. I see him occasionally during lunch and after school, but I can usually arrange my life so I don’t have to see him and enter his Bubble Zone of Terror.

Except one day, I somehow end up behind him in line at lunch. He does his usual thing of taking some physical attribute of mine, (my incredibly pale demeanor for example; he liked to call me “Albino Fag” as I recall) and pelts me. But this time, I don’t let it go and slink off. I hold my ground and things go the way things do when pubescent teenagers spout off. We are about to have a fight, the one that has been brewing and stewing for at least three years. He is around a bunch of his friends, so he can’t just back down. He’ll look like an idiot. As I recall, I’m by myself. He says something about not wanting to get suspended so we’ll have the fight after school on the practice football field.

I have no recollection of the rest of that day. Pretty sure I don’t learn anything, that’s for sure. But I am DONE having him push me around. Even if I get the crap beat out of me, at least he will know he can’t just push me around with impunity any more. My reasoning isn’t quite so profound or lucid as I just described, but I just know I have to stand up for myself for once. I’d done it once in the relative safety of the band hall, so maybe I could/should do it out on the football field.

I’ll spare you the details of my nausea, sweating and nervous jittering during the day and say this:

I showed up at the field at 3:00 PM. Waited for a while.

He never showed up.

He also never bothered me again.

I don’t think he ever said anything to me ever again, he basically ignored me, much as I’d tried to ignore and avoid him for all those years.

So there’s that.

Jon scribbled this mess on 11/12/07 at 12:56 PM, best we can tell it fits in the category of Regular Post. This many folks had something to say about that, The permanent home of this entry is here: Link

Monday, November 12, 2007

Redemption and Vindication

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