Tom's Graduation Party

So last night showing up a half hour late ended up being about 2 hours early so tonight I decided that I would be in no rush to show up to my friend Tom's graduation party being held in my ol' hometown. I walked into the restaurant and made my way downstairs just as the DJ was calling up his mom and dad to do a speach. As soon as I filled the doorway and looked inside everyone was looking directly at me because his parents were standing just to the side of the door with a mic. I have never had a knack for knowing when to do things, but I did get a chuckle which is a normally a good thing. I waited outside for the music to start back up and came on in. Tom was sitting with a bunch of people at a full table, so I went over, said hello, and moved to another table and sat down with a bunch of friends that had an extra space. Tonight was awesome because everyone who showed up tonight, with a few exceptions, were from the class of 99 and it was like the second installment of my reunion weekend. Probably 40 of us were there and the funny part was that only 3 of us were at the reunion last night.

Just about everyone there tonight I had been very close with at one point or another and it really felt good to be together again. What was a little strange was that a lot of my friends' parents and siblings showed up. Now this wasn't as wierd as it would have been in high school because all of the younger siblings who used to be whiny little kids are now younger siblings in college and the parents who had been protective and used to keep a keen eye on their little babies are now more like old friends. I felt old for about 5 minutes, then I realized that everything is the same. We all still hang out, most of us live within 20 minutes of where we grew up, and we all still enjoy being together. I really hope tonight spurs us into being close again. I would hate for this to be the last time we all hang out for another 5 years.

Another phenomenon that I realized tonight and last night is that a lot of people I have known for years have fluxuated in weight considerably over the past 5 years. I would say more than 75% of my friend put on between 10 and 30 lbs while in college and most if not all of them lost it all in the past couple of years. Even people who only put on a pound or two are back to their original weight. I left high school at 270lbs (light for me, but I was in lacrosse season in the spring which always took 20 lbs off me) I played last NIFL season at 340lbs and now I am 310lbs. I think with my football career my weight is a little different of an issue, but I better just keep telling myself that. All in all, everyone looked great.

I don't want to get into a person by person recount of tonight's meetings, but there were a few that stand out. First, was Gilbert (last name). He was allways a pudgy kid, but he has lost a lot of weight and looked great. He has lost considerably more hair than me and has somewhat of a combover, but he is such an awesome kid that he could have grown a second head and still been awesome. He is the ultimate comedic partner. He has the timing of a pro and knows exactly what you are getting at all the time. Him and I used to screw around in class together and he has always had my back on any line of thinking I've ever had. Tonight was no exception. I like to think of myself the same way, but damn, that kid is hilarious. He hadn't forgot one inside joke, one prank, one instance since I've known him and everything he said was delivered perfectly. If I ever went into comedy, I'd want him up there with me. I punched his new cell number in my phone and gave him (and everyone else) my business card. He's in town, so expect to hear about him in my later postings.

The next person who I must acknowledge is Kelly. Without going into a 10 page story, she is my ex and was the first girl I had ever loved. She was the first girl I ever dated, the first girl I ever kissed, and the first girl to make me cry. She was the biggest part of my life for the majority of 5 years and my experiences with her will stick with me forever. That is both good and bad because my relationship with her was a painful one. It started with the fat goofy 8th grader who was not accepted by his classmates, teammates, etc and a cute girl with acne and glasses that he found beautiful. Our relationship started with a goodmorning every morning and a goodbye every afternoon. It sounds like nothing, but it meant everything in the entire world to me because I thought she was everything and the fact that she would do that every day gave me a reason to wake up in the morning. We were both in all the excellerated classes and because her last name was the first C name and mine was next to last in the Bs we were always near each other on seating charts and locker assignments. I was so damn shy that on valentines day I didn't think it would be OK for me to bring her a flower. At the end of the day I said something like, "I wanted to bring you flowers, but I didn't know if you would accept them from me." She told me she would have loved them, so I made my mom stop at the florist on valentines day so I could wait in line with all the other dudes that waited until the last minute. I bought one pink rose. I felt so wierd bringing it in I put it in 3 bags so nobody would know what it was. I then walked into the home ec room and asked if I could keep in in the fridge until the end of the day with my face so full of blood that if someone had poked me with a needle I think my whole head would have exploded. I picked up the rose before 9th period and put it in my locker. When we were both in the hall and were getting our stuff together for basketball I took out the tripple bagged rose and slid it accross the floor to her. I had never been so nervous in my life. She loved it, and that was the beginning. It wasn't until some time later that we officially were "going out," but she was all I could think about. I begged my parents until they agreed to put a second phone line in our house so I could call her every night and for the duration of our relationship we were on the phone every single night for HOURS. As freshmen football players, we didn't dress for the varsity games, so I used to take her every single week. It was one of the only things I could do with her that didn't involve my mom's teal minivan. We would sit and hold hands the whole game and it would make me so fucking happy to just be holding onto her. I still remember the adrenaline pumping just when we first held hands and walked to the front of the school to get picked up after the game. I can't belive I'm letting this entry turn into this, but bear with me, it was going to happen one time or another, might as well be tonight. Our first kiss was after a 6 to 3 overtime playoff loss to Morris Knolls on November 11th, 1995. Everyone was getting up to leave and she just leaned over and we kissed for probably 10 seconds and then we held hands to the front of the school. I still remember looking down at her girlfriends and seeing them all look at us like we were the cutest thing in the world. I was the emperor of the free world. I was pharoh over all of egypt. I had just pulled the sword from the stone and earned my rights to the throne. I was a rockstar and the MVP of the superbowl and anything else you could possibly imagine. I went home and totally forgot that my role models on the varsity squad had just had their championship dreams destroyed by a 1 yard run by the full back in overtime. I had never been so proud in my life. That was also our last kiss because I had no idea how to make it happen again and a few months later she cheated on me with the guy who played next to me on the O and D line. That was my first real sense of loss in my little stupid life and if I could have cried any harder or prayed to die in my sleep with any more conviction I would have. I ran out of tears a month later and finally started thinking about other things. Her relationship with Joe didn't last and the summer after our sophomore year we were going back out, but this time I felt like I had to earn it. I felt unworthy and would grovel for her affection. I would call her up and she would be in a bad mood and I would beg her for forgiveness even if I had done nothing wrong. With all the abuse I was taking in school and with how lowly I saw myself, this was the only chance at love I had. She had a hand in making our relationship like this. I don't know if it was intentional or it just happened that way, but I felt like I was unworthy and that she was above me and that is how our relationship went. She would ask me when I was going to call her, if I was late by even a few minutes I was begging for forgiveness and she was threatening to leave me. My lowest moment of whippedness was my senior year. My O-Line coach told us that if we rushed for over 200 yards and didnt' let up a sack he would take us all out for steaks. We rushed for almost 300 yards and passed for 100 with no sacks, so he told us on the saturday after the game that tuesday we would be out for a steak dinner. I didn't go because I hadn't warned Kelly far enough in advance that I wouldnt' be around for our 4 hour conversation that night. I was the captain of the team and the only offensive lineman to skip it. During the course of our relationship I spent time with only her, forgot about all my friends, let my grades slip, and got in trouble in sports all because I was so afraid of losing her. On December 6th, 1998 I realized it was over. That day was the best day of my entire life. I don't think there is an event that could possibly happen to me from now until the day I die that could ever hold a candle to that day. If I won the lottery and slept with both of the olsen twins it would still not match December 6th, 1998. That was the day Roxbury High School won it's first state championship 7 to 6 at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, NJ. We were 44 point underdogs and started out our highschool careers at 3-6 as freshmen. We ended 10-2 and our school's first ever state champs after over 100 years of football. I have not yet since cried in joy like I did that afternoon. I was bleeding and bruised. Exhausted and happy. Instead of hanging out with the rest of the team, I picked up Kelly in my 86 cutlass salon and we went out for coffee. At one point in the night she got mad and said, "If all you are going to talk about is football, bring me home." I didn't right away, but I did cut the night short and went home. That week I was talking to her and she said something like, "fine, if that's how you feel, then it's over. We're breaking up." That was about the 15 trillionth time she'd dropped that on me, but this time instead of begging on my knees for forgiveness I just said, "OK then. It's over." It wasn't officially over for another week, but that would be another enourmous story and this one wasn't supposed to happen tonight either, so just know that it came down to me telling her that we were through and both of us moving on.

Back to tonight. Kelly's mom, dad, sister, and boyfriend were all at Tom's graduation and I am still a little uncomfortable around her so I didnt' know when the right time to say hello would be. I know from experience that ex boyfriends hanging around your girl is stressful, so dude law said not to start up a conversation with her in front of him, let her start one with me. So I was haning out with the beautiful redhead Erika (who is a whole nother story) who I had hung out with last night. She and I were talking last night about the worst drinking night of my life that ended with me not drinking for almost a year and I asked her if she would not bring it up at Tom's party because everyone there was at that party including my friend Awesome Dan's parents. That party I am speaking of was a blast until my jackass friend koWALA decided that our punch needed an extra liter of grain alcohol, gave my allready drunk ass a glass without telling me, and damn near killed me. I woke up the next afternoon in my own bed, naked, with my truck in the driveway and no idea what the fuck had just happened. After about a month of questioning I found out I made the biggest fool out of myself, tried to drive home, got beat up by 9 of my friends until I gave up my keys, tried to jog home (about 7 miles) passed out in the woods in a patch of poison ivy, then was shoveled up into the bed of my truck and carried into my house, past my mortified parents and into my room where I locked myself in and I guess, got naked and went to sleep. I still have trouble looking Awesome Dan's Awesome parents in the eye, but for a year afterwards I avoided all my friend like the plague because the ALL were there. So anyways, Erika said she wouldn't say anything if I'd buy her a drink the next night. I have always loved her to death, so buying her drinks and getting to spend time with her seemed like a fair punishment for her knowing aweful stories about me and keeping them quiet. So I go to the bar to open a tab and get her a gin and tonic and myself a nice cool bottle of budweiser. The bar didn't take plastic, so I had to leave and go to an ATM down the road. On my way, Kelly's mom grabs me by the arm and starts talking to me. That woman hated me with every ounce of her being when I was dating her daughter and she also made her daughter the way she is. I have never liked her and even though I was never rude or smart assed to her, she still always kept a close eye on me. Her father is the nicest guy in the whole world and I really enjoyed talking to him. When we were going out and I was all into sports he told me that after college he had a shot with the Mets. He was an outfielder and had played in the minors for a while and was just about to break into the majors when he met maureen. THAT WOMAN MADE HIM CHOOSE BETWEEN BASEBALL AND HER AND HE CHOSE HER!!!! You could tell it killed him inside and that if he had it to do all over again he would be an outfielder for the mets and she would be the subject of his stupid blog just like Kelly is to me. I've always seen him as a broken man who got trapped with a woman that treated him like crap. I dont' know much about their relationship, but every trait I didn't like in Kelly I saw mirrored perfectly in her mother so I can't imagine his relationship being all peaches and cream. So I talk to her for a minute or two, she coments on how big I am and wants to know all about my football career. I drop a few press release lines on her and make my way to the door. I am stopped 3 more times by parents of friends and it takes me a good half hour to walk 50 feet to the door.

So I go and get that paper and come back to the party. I took out $100 and it felt good to know that I could take it out and not worry about seeing "declined" pop up on the window. For years taking out a 20 dollar bill was a miracle. Working sucks, but having the money is good. I get back, buy Erika her drink and come back to the table to find Kelly sitting in my chair. She says something about talking to her mom before talking to her being wrong and we chuckle. I ended up talking to her more than I would have expected, and it was nice to talk to someone who was so important to me for so long, but it's also amazing how I look at her like you would look at a picture. She is a piece of history, a painting that you study. She is not like other girls that I would look at and make a mental note of their hotness. She is just there. Even in person it's like talking on the phone. She did mention that she tells the story of my cousin's black child. I didn't appreciate it because my cousin works as a social worker and deals with a lot of sex offenders and the way her family totally doesn't say a word about why her husband is blonde haired with blue eyes and his daughter is black says something to the circumstances under which this might have happened. She made it sound like it's a cute little story. To me it shows my cousin's devotion to the importance of human life, her husbands deep and undieing love for his wife, and just how special all life is even if it's started out the wrong way. My little black 2nd cousin is one of the sweetest little girls you'll ever meet in your life. She has a mom and dad who love her very much and a family who never once has made her feel different, but Kelly thinks it's a joke, and icebreaker with new people, some little factoid that means nothing. It hurt me. I don't know if she was trying to regain dominance in a relationship where I hold all the cards or if she truely belived that a story I told her in confidence back when I thought she was the woman I was going to spend the rest of my life with was just something to throw around at parties. Even though I make this sound like it was the foucus of our evening, it was not. After I brushed that dirt off my shoulders we had a pleasent conversation and went our own ways. I kept looking at her little boyfriend and wondering what must be going through his head. I am a good 6 inches taller and probably about 150 lbs heavier than him and built like a tank standing there talking to his girlfriend who is my ex and laughing and having a great time. I don't know if it's just me, but I would have been sizing the guy up in case I had to smack a bitch. He just kinda sat there and didn't even respond when I said stuff directly at him. I am very territorial and even though I am harmless I have a tendency to act like a grizzly when I am uncomfortable with someone. Even though I know he has NOTHING to worry about, how does he know? He should have at least given me a dirty look or took a stance that was threatening or something. I felt kinda cheated.

After a few more minutes the bar was closed and everyone was pushed out the door. All of us class of 99ers decided that we were going down the road to a TGIFridays for a few more rounds. I picked up Erika another gin and tonic, Tom a budweiser, and myself a jack and coke and we just hung out and bullshitted for hours. I got to spend a lot of time with Erika which was great. I had a crush on her when we were kids and have been facinated with her ever since. She is probably the smartest person I've ever met and also one of the most talented artists. On the flip side she can be the most hurtful and mean person I've ever seen. When she uses her superior intellect against you, there is nothing you can do but be embarrased. I don't know if that is why I can't get enough of her or what, but I really enjoy her company. I think it's because you know that if she is laughing you really did say something funny and that if she's acting interested in what you're doing she really is interested. You really have to be on point or she'll knock you down. Tonight I was on point. I don't know if it was the free drinks I put in her or if she was just feeling a sense of nostalgia hanging out with all of us for the first time in years, but she was really nice and fun tonight. I really hope to see more of her and everybody in the coming weeks.

Tom, is Tom. He is another genious with a whacky sense of humor that makes everything fun. He sleeps in a bed shaped like a racecar and has posters on the walls that have been there since the early 90s including MC Hammer, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and a patrick Ewing rookie vintage. What's amazing about Tom is that he will be singing the Meow Mix commercial in the highest octave humanly possible one moment and then talking about politics with the next breath. He is currently working out in Chicago, but I really hope he comes back to the Jersey in the near future because he is just an amazing guy.

There was another Bad Lauren sighting. She was also in the restaurant in the dining section with the girls she came to the reunion with and a buddy of mine we'll call Russless. I again played the shy little boy game and didn't have the balls to go over and talk to her and her friends when I heard they were coming in, but then after another jack and coke I thought back to all the years I wished I was in contact with her but was too much of a puss in boots and walked over and just said hello. I talked with the whole group of them for about 5 minutes and then said something like, "hey I saw you guys come in and just wanted to let you know that a bunch of us are just hanging out by the bar if you want to stop in and say hello before you leave." I am Don Juan De La Neuch, but they didn't stop by. When we left, I looked back and their booth was empty. I don't know what I expected to happen, but it was a little bit of a downer. Her friends and my friends were two totally different groups with a couple exceptions and I understand them not coming over, but I still felt like I missed an extremely rare opportunity to see Bad Lauren. To make things even more interesting she was sitting in the middle of a round booth that was full with people on both sides. I try not to make it obvious that I am only talking to her when she is in a group of my friends, but I don't think I did a good job tonight.

I am getting carried away with these posts. Hopefully once I've caught you guys up to speed on some of my past I can cut them down to a reasonable size. If you read all of this... you should get a medal.