the miseducation of patrick dunn

After careful consideration, I have reached a conclusion that my tenure at the John W. Rogers Middle School were arguably the worst years of my life. The hierarchical social structure of junior high was so damaging to my underdeveloped soul, that it created a monster within me that I have spent years trying to put to rest. While most of my classmates were experiencing the brave new world of second base, I was still at home reading Wolverine comic books. I did not care that my balls were dropping, I was too attached to the ongoing saga of an angry, hairy man who did not mind wearing brightly colored spandex in public.

By the time I read my final comic book panel, it was already sixth grade and it was far too late to make a splash on the social scene. I mean, I still let my mother pick out my clothes in the morning - which were always neon colored track suits from the clearance rack at K-Mart. She may have saved herself a few bucks out of the family clothing budget, but she would be writing checks to a psychotherapist for years if she didn’t pull her ass out of the sand and allow me to dress myself. Sadly, when I actually started to pick out my own clothes I had no sense of the current fashion trends and wore the same black Champion brand hooded sweatshirt to school five days a week; even if it was 85 degree weather.

Also, most of my peers were shedding their deadweight friends and moving up the social ladder. As for me? I was still stuck with these two chubby deadbeat acquaintances from my elementary school years. I secretly used to pray that one of them would move away or get kidnapped or something; but it never happened. I even tried acting like the world’s biggest asshole in hopes they would both just go away, but they still kept knocking on my front door asking me if I wanted to play tag. Tag? Sixth graders don’t play tag, they try to sneak in over-the-bra boob grabs on the three girls who started developing early. That was the life I wanted. That was the life I envied.

In seventh grade, I realized that my only hope for escaping this slump was to find friends that lived in other towns. I had no idea how I was going to pull this off, but I was determined to find a way. My first strategy involved working on my image. I carefully studied the styles of teenage guys from popular television series like Beverly Hills 90210, My So-Called Life, and to a lesser extent, Saved by the Bell, both original and new class. I decided to settle on a style somewhere between Dylan McKay and Jordan Catalino: dark, mysterious, and brooding was clearly the way to go. I even invented several back-story scenarios, with my favorite one being that I was the adopted son of a former teenage hand model who lost some of her fingers in a horrible garbage disposal accident.

Next up was finding somewhere to go where I could easily blend in and comfortably meet others without it seeming forceful. Kids my age loved the mall, so I had my parents drop me off on Friday nights and familiarized myself with the various groups that gathered in the food courts, arcades, and record stores. Over the course of several months, I somehow managed to successfully infiltrate a group of friends from a neighboring town. Soon I was invited to their school dances, roller skating birthday parties, and all the other pleasantries that comes with having a large group of friends. I was finally starting to have the life I always dreamed of.

To maintain this new found glory, I had to keep up this charade for as long as I could. I only met with them on their turf and very rarely did I bring up my lack of social ties in my own hometown. I even portrayed myself as middle class in my school’s social hierarchy. Whatever funny moment happened with my classmates at school on any given day, I would share with my new friends as if I was a part of the gang; when in reality I sat quietly in the back of the classroom fantasizing about living in this other town. Also, my biggest rule was that under no circumstances could they know about my two childhood friends, in which I was still struggling to shake off.

Then on June 16, 1995, both worlds collided with the arrival of Batman Forever. I had made plans with my new friends to see the movie while unbeknownst to me that my two old buddies would also be in the theater with us that night. Not only that, but they would be sitting in the two seats directly in front of me. I somehow managed to make it through the movie without being spotted, but as soon as the lights came on, one of them turned around and looked directly at me. The next five seconds felt like an eternity, as a million thoughts were racing through my mind and I knew this moment was highly crucial to the careful planning I had accomplished over the last six months. Before my old pal had a chance to open his sloppy lips that had popcorn crumbs dangling from them and speak my name, I did what any rational thirteen year old in my position would have done; I ignored him as if I had no idea who he was and walked away with my new friends.

In my high school, if a class you really wanted to take was filled or you were just too lazy to pass in the course registration forms, you found yourself stuck in Intro to Home Economics. The course itself was an easy A, but the curriculum hadn’t been updated for several decades, which was great if you aspired to be a 50s homemaker. The teenage girls of the 90s that often took this class were of a different breed. Collectively, they were influenced by the rage of an in her prime Courtney Love, the raw sexuality of Gwen Stefani, and the fire-starting energy of Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes. Now somewhere in the middle of all of this madness stood me, the only male in the classroom; as aforementioned, I was too lazy to pass in the course registration forms.

Our teacher attempted to prep the girls for a lifetime of serving their families, and myself, if I ever got involved in a Who’s the Boss-type situation. Wars would often break out between the students and the teacher on a daily basis relating to the obsolete methods of the lesson plan. I remember one day where we were learning how to properly set a dinner table. One girl rolled her eyes at the idea of society dictating where to properly place the eating utensils, “This is utter bullshit,” she huffed, “When I’m thirty years old and come home from a day of work, I’ll put the fork and knife where I damn well please!”

She was kicked out of the class.

A few weeks later, we abandoned the kitchen, which resembled a miniature version of a Father Knows Best set, and entered the sad, lonely world of the sewing room. A cloud of awkwardness always hung in the air during Home Economics class. While instructing us on how to properly thread the bobbin, our teacher shared her theory that the secret to keeping a man was knowing how to hem a pair of pants. I would always sit in the back of the classroom in hopes of blending into the wall whenever comments of this nature were spoken.

Anyway, after a few registered complaints from some of the other students and their parents, we spent the rest of the school year making Rice Krispie treats and deep-frying french fries and mozzarella sticks, you know, the stuff that really mattered to us.

There was a time in my life when I viewed Justin Timberlake as being one of the most threatening human beings alive. It was more than being subjected to his bland, manufactured pop music, or knowing he was getting blow-jobs from Britney Spears; both I could get over. Instead, it was the awareness of that strange hold he had over my female companions. I viewed him as this contagion that was causing erratic behavior in girls - with symptoms ranging from the tasteless plastering of six thousand magazine clippings on their bedroom walls to those embarrassing self-produced audition tapes for MTV’s FANatic.

Then, somewhere along the way came his first solo album, “Justified,” and it was like the Berlin Wall had come crashing down again. The years of hatred, jealousy, and disdain were slowly beginning to dissolve. I often pinpoint the radio premier of “Rock Your Body,” as being the moment when I was ready to admit to the world that I no longer felt threatened or annoyed by Justin Timberlake. I can even recall a moment where I was driving alone and got through the whole song without ever changing the station. Although, to spare myself embarrassment, I did turn the volume down low at red light stops.

Today, I wonder if the current crop of heterosexual male teenagers will ever share a similar epiphany for Justin Bieber and the way he currently enthralls their female counterparts; or if their misdirected anger will fade into an irrelevancy akin to the days of the not so menacing Nick Lachey and his collection of deep v-neck tees.