Kindergarten: Five Things. One lie.

In my previous post, I alluded to something I remember about kindergarten, noting that I don't remember much about the time I spent there.

Now that I think about it, I remember more than I originally estimated, but as far as actual events are concerned (and not general things like classmates' names or physical details of the rooms, etc.), I remember five of them, considering only one of them to be truly important.

One. We ate paste. When I was in kindergarten, in addition to having glue, we had adhesive paste. I never used it after kindergarten, and I don't recall either of my younger sisters using it when they were in elementary school, so ever since a few years after kindergarten I always thought that I was one of the very last people ever to use it. There's no way that's true, but I thought it for a long time.

Anyway, I remember the day we ate the paste. It was a group of four or five of us. It was regrettable and, in a surprising turn of events, minty.

Two. We ate crackers with butter on them. The crackers themselves were buttery, too; they weren't saltines. I have no idea why we did this. Now that I think about it, it's possible that someone my teacher knew made the butter. I think we may have been talking about making butter. Really, I think the whole thing was just a way for my teacher to have what was likely one of her favorite snacks. Why else would you talk about making butter with your kindergarten class?

Three. A girl named Katie threatened boys on the bus with a belt. She was the only Katie I went to elementary school with; there were Katherines and Kates, but no Katies - and she went to another school after kindergarten. She was wearing a dress, not any sort of garment that would require the wearing of a belt. Threatening boys on the bus by snapping a belt was such a good idea that she went out of her way to bring one to school - this couldn't wait until a day on which she might wear a belt anyway. That's almost as dumb as writing about this event in such a way that suggests that kindergarteners might voluntarily wear belts at some point.

Four. Stop, drop and roll. One day in kindergarten, we talked about fire safety. As one might expect, this eventually involved discussion of stopping, of dropping and of rolling. When I was in kindergarten, I was pretty happy to be at school. All the way through elementary, really. I liked it and I got a lot of satisfaction out of it. I was more than a little bit of a goodie-goodie. Almost as much of a goodie-goodie as my classmate who composed and sang a song in front of class at music time, the lyrics to which go like this:

I like school and school likes me,
I'm as happy as can be,
I like school and school likes me.

I still remember the melody.

The first (only?) time this got me in trouble came on the day we talked about stopping, dropping and rolling. On the bus home, I sat next to David Barker, who was blonde and tiny. We got to talking (and to getting excited) about stop, drop and roll.

At this point, I began to physically demonstrate in the bus seat. David Barker got a bloody nose. I don't need to tell you how funny it was.

Five. My teacher lied to me. My teacher lied to me and I will never, ever forget it.

We were using a particular type of plastic blocks. They were sort of Lego-ish in that they locked together, but were a softer plastic and only had one shape and size. You could stack them in a line and that was about it. The teacher was having us use them in order to teach us about patterns.

We were instructed to use different colors of blocks to create a pattern. I was doing this next to a girl named Megan Sutherland. I remember that it was her because, had my teacher not told me a terrible, terrible lie, Megan would have been the focus of my anger, not Miss Petersen.

I was sitting on the floor, taking the plastic blocks out of a bin and constructing my pattern. The pattern went like this:

Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Red. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Green. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Red. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Yellow. Green...and so on.

My pattern took considerably longer to develop than all the other ones in the classroom. It also took many, many more yellow blocks than the others. That's the part that was disagreeable to Megan Sutherland. As Miss Petersen walked by, Megan told her, "Miss Petersen, Jon's hoggin' all the yellows."

Miss Petersen, in what (in my experience) was the only wrong thing she ever did to anyone, turned to me and lied:

"Jon, that's not a pattern."

It was a damn pattern. I fought, trying to explain to my teacher how it was a pattern. It didn't really matter; she understood that it was. But she told me it wasn't.

My pattern took more brains (...and more blocks) than those of the other students. It shouldn't have been taken away from me because it was inconvenient. Or even if I had to give up the yellow blocks, I certainly didn't deserve to be lied to.

What if I hadn't fought it? What if I didn't hold on to what I knew to be true? In my mind, that was a truly dangerous moment. It could have been the first step toward developing a very different mind than I have today. For convenience. To avoid ruffling any feathers.

I don't know for sure whether that moment actually triggered anything that ended up affecting my mind long-term for the better. But I have to think that the fact that I so vividly remember it suggests that it was very important.

I very genuinely thank God that I resisted in that moment. The consequences could have been staggering. It was a pattern.

Slouching, Then and Now.

Most of the time, I have terrible posture.

For much of the day, my head and shoulders are lowered and leaning forward as I appear to be a few inches shorter than I actually am. I've been like this for long enough that standing up straight with my shoulders back in line with my body feels unnatural and uncomfortable. It started when I was young, and the way it began doesn't have much of anything to do with the way it is now.

I slouched when I was young, but it didn't really start until kindergarten. This was the first place I went regularly and had repetitive social interaction with people who weren't part of my family. (You might be thinking, "what about preschool?" I only went to preschool for two days. I didn't like it.)

When I got to kindergarten, I very quickly noticed that I was noticeably taller than everyone else. There were others in my age group at Emmet D. Williams Elementary who were as tall as or taller than me for most of my time there, but at the time they were in the PM kindergarten class, which met later in the day. I was an AM kindergarten student, and my teacher (to whom I was as attracted as a kindergartener can be, regardless of the fact that she was likely at least five times older than me at that point) had the same initials as I did. Her name was Janis Petersen.

When I would stand around and talk with the other students, it felt weird to be several inches above them. I didn't know anything about...well, anything at that point (I was in kindergarten), and I figured that if I was talking to people my age and "fitting in," I shouldn't be towering over them. So I slouched. I did what I thought was necessary to fit in (which contrasts sharply with one of the only other things I remember about kindergarten, about which I will blog sometime soon).

But when I got older, I developed an entirely different reason for slouching. My motivation for slouching began to change when I was in middle school, which was absolutely the worst time of my life and (hopefully) will remain so for the rest of my existence.

In middle school, I didn't slouch to avoid the appearance that I was different from the other students. I slouched to avoid being noticed, as my two years in middle school were filled with people treating me and others in ways nobody should ever be treated. If someone noticed me, they would notice how completely seventh-grade, don't-understand-what-the-hell-is-going-on awkward I was, and then start to mistreat me.

It would be kind of weird (and would reveal lots of deep-seeded issues) if the reason I slouched when I'm 26 stemmed from things that happened when I was 13. Instead, the reason I slouch today is both different from and related to my previous reasons for slouching.

I slouch today because of the cumulative effect of innumerable disappointments and embarassments which my mind refuses to forget.

I remember so, so many embarassing or shameful events from my life, no matter how small. I don't know why I remember them so vividly, but I do.

When I was very young, I was running around in my back yard. I wandered into my neighbor's yard, where my neighbor was sitting around with her yippy, terribly annoying chihuahua, whose name was Mitsy. At one point, I got to hold the dog. I don't remember whether I asked to hold the dog or whether I was asked if I'd like to hold it.

I dropped it.

I vividly remember exactly where I was standing at that moment. I remember the exact direction I was facing and where my neighbor was in relation to me. I remember looking down at her (I was standing, she was sitting in a chair) and I remember the exact look on her face as she yelled at me: "GO HOME NOW! YOU COULD HAVE BROKE HER BACK!" I remember very clearly that she said "broke" and not "broken." I remember what her glasses looked like. I remember the tone of red her face took on as she yelled it, and I remember beginning to cry instantly and sprinting into my house.

I remember this and a number of other similarly shameful incidents I repeatedly went over in my head during my youth. I don't know why these things stick with me as well as they do. It probably just comes with my hyper-introspective nature and how deeply I've always desired to avoid disappointing people (middle child!).

I don't really know where I'm going with this. I slouch. There are reasons. The reasons have changed over the years. I don't have any way to bring this all together. Writing a blog about nothing in particular is usually done under the assumption that the readers are interested enough not to need me to take this in any more dramatic or productive direction.

General Tso Explains Colombia.

Recently, I've had an unusually strong desire to eat spicy food.

I have a few memories of really good, spicy Asian food, so I've been grabbing food from different Chinese places around town lately, asking whoever's taken my order to spice it up a bit (a lot). Most of these experiences have been fairly disappointing. I've requested extra spicy food and received a plate of tasty-but-not-so-piquant food. This happened like five or six times in a row.

Two Fridays ago, I got out of work and drove to a Chinese place by my house that's open until midnight. I walked in and placed a take-out order for General Tso's chicken. Desperately hoping to end my streak of disappointing requests for spice, I said something to the effect of "can you make that really, really spicy? Like really spicy. Like a lot. Just give it to me. Let me have it."

The woman who took my order, concerned for my well-being, asked me, "are you sure?" to which I responded, "just... try to kill me."

After telling me "okay..." in a tone meant to absolve her of all responsibility for the scorching of my palate, she communicated my request (in a foreign language I can only assume was Asian in origin) to the cook. I don't understand a lick of whatever language they were speaking, but it was very clear from their tone and repetition that it would have been something like this in English:

Hostess: "He says he wants it really, really, really spicy."
Cook: "Is he sure?"
Hostess: "He said try to kill him. Really, really, really spicy."
Cook: "Is he sure?"
Hostess: "Yes, he's sure."
Cook: "Really?"
Hostess: "Really, really, really spicy."
Cook: "Really?"
Hostess: "That's what he said. Don't look at me."

This was encouraging. It assured me that if I wasn't going to get my desired level of spiciness, I'd at least get their best attempt at it. I don't think I even have a particularly high tolerance for spicy food. I've just wanted it lately.

When the hostess brought my order to me, she handed me the bag and told me "good luck with your chicken" on the way out. I went from encouraged to mildly nervous. I was either going to get exactly what I asked for and love it or get exactly what I asked for and get the crap kicked out of me by a plate of Chinese.

I drove home and began to eat. It was hot. It wasn't the sort of spiciness that bites you immediately. Rather, it just got hotter and hotter and hotter as I ate. I could feel an intense warmth in my cheeks (which, according to my roommate, were quite red), I was sweating, and by the time I had finished the plate of food, my tongue was considerably swollen. It was a combination of physical reactions to food that would really freak someone out unless they had asked for them; it was very unsettling. I absolutely loved it.

I recently spent five weeks in Colombia, doing ridiculous physical labor in ridiculous heat, humidity and sunlight. I felt physical comfort for a cumulative total of what could have only been a few days throughout the trip. In addition to the physical rigors of the trip, it was filled with deep and honest introspection and toil over my inner state of being, my life and its direction.



Now, almost two full months after my return from the trip (I have spent more time back from Colombia than I did in Colombia), that plate of Chinese food is the most fitting analogy I can use to explain my experience. It was painful. It was increasingly intense, having more effects on me than I could have anticipated.

It was the time of my life.

Cancer.

I don't have it. Well, really I don't know, I guess. But I haven't been diagnosed with it. I haven't been checked for it, either. One of my roommates and I were having a discussion about it last night. That's why I'm blogging about it.

We were watching Dexter, which is a television series about a blood spatter analyst who lives a double life as a serial killer. It's far more interesting than the description I just gave. Even so, it's pretty clear that conversations that are sparked by viewing the show won't center on happy things like lollipops or unicorns.

No, I suppose lollipops can't really be happy. And I guess unicorns can be downright ornery at times. Tell you what - you find a grumpy unicorn and bring it to me, and I'll stop blogging about cancer.

So my roommate and I were talking about cancer. Our discussion was sparked by a moment in an episode of Dexter where a long time acquaintance of the main character (who's name, in a surprising twist of events, is Dexter) is dying of a terminal illness. We started talking about the ways in which it would be really, really, really bad to die of a long, drawn-out illness. After covering a few different angles in that conversation, I shared with my roommate a thought I've had about cancer in the last year or two:

Were I diagnosed with cancer, I would seriously consider refusing treatment.

Of course, this kind of thought (or many thoughts I have about many things, I suppose) would be subject to rapid and radical change in the event that I became aware of a life-threatening disease that was ravaging my body. But it's the thought I've had on the subject lately.

I suppose one might wonder what sort of stupid, backwards reasoning I have behind this thought. I don't think it's quite so backwards - I mean, it is MY thought, right? Anyway, here it is:

From what I've seen while having only been connected to three people who have suffered from cancer (two of whom have died from it), the physical realities of a disease that has destroyed countless lives (both of those afflicted and those surrounding them) are secondary in my mind to this concern:

When someone has cancer (as far as I've seen, anyway), his or her whole life is about cancer. Every personal interaction is laden with cancer. "Hey, how are you feeling? You doin' okay?" Hey, is that...? Yeah, that's him. Oh, how's he doing? Cancer becomes the frame of reference for most everyone talking to or about the person who has it. A person's identity is taken over by a disease. This, in my uninformed, know-nothing-about-cancer opinion, is why cancer is so terrible.

Realistically, I don't have any right to speak about this stuff as though I know anything about it. But that's what I think about it. I don't mean to offend people who have had experiences with cancer. I also ended two consecutive paragraphs with a colon, making it seem as though my blog was just coming around to some point that would actually never be made. I don't mean to offend people with literature backgrounds. Grumpy unicorn, I'll stop doing both.