Free Ride

At the end of the block there was a cul de sac that led to a series of dirt lots where new houses were being developed. There was a small lake dug out at the center of the neighborhood being built. Kids I went to school with rode around on new bmx bikes, I remember Randy had an Ashtabula bike, Chris K. had a Redline that I envied the hell out of. I felt ugly and insecure sometimes, sometimes I would look in the mirror and think that I had a handsome face. I always felt fat, even when I was playing a lot of sports and was a skinny kid. I always felt this pressure to stay at home, practice piano, stick the routine of swimming and karate practice, and at the same time maintain straight A's so that I could eventually get into a prestigious college and go to medical school - and at the same time be a 'cool guy'. All the cool guys at my school were stupid good looking kids that were probably smoking by the age of 12. Nowadays kids are fucking and doing heroin by age 10, I'm kind of scared for N. I remember daydreaming about being a famous celebrity - I was always a famous singer, my daydreams played out like music videos in which I was the star. There was always a pretty girl around whom the dramatic action revolved. Sometimes she resembled girls from my life, pretty girls who were just starting to develop breasts and gossip about making out. In some alternate reality right next to mine other boys were already 'going out' with these girls, which amounted to nothing but talking shyly, passing notes, gossip among mutual friends. Maybe kids these days have moved onto S&M and porno shoots, again I shudder for N. My hair was long and greasy and I wore the same pair of ill fitting jeans and red t Adidas t shirt every day, my style was always copied off of kids at my school who I wasn't exactly friends with but knew socially and whom I admired because I thought they were better looking, cooler, more popular and more sexually advanced than me. I used to make an effort to make these kids my friends. And they weren't necessarily 'jock' kids, they were actually borderline burnout kids, kids whose parents had divorced, who in a few years would probably start smoking pot. My parents never approved of my friends, they made an effort to isolate me as much as possible from the people I was friends with. I remember when B. moved to California, it was like I didn't know him anymore. I couldn't even call him when we went out there for vacation. I always had trouble asserting my need to hang out with my friends around my parents, while my brother L. would always bring his friends to the house. He had more wholesome friends than I, kids that would go on to be all state in something or other. I always loved people that were surly, rebellious, alienated to a certain extent, outsiders - but they had to be beautiful people. These were all guys by the way. Women were always a mystery to me, they still are. Even my wife, whom I know better than any woman, cotinues to do things that baffle me. She is the sun that warms my life, brings me happiness, when she wakes up I'm alive.