The Eighties: A Bitchen Time To Be a Teenager!
Page 12
I never stepped on the field again.
In retrospect, I regret that decision. The JV and Varsity teams that year went a combined 1-19, but, so what? I should have swallowed my pride, taken my place on the JV team (where I rightfully belonged), and played for the sake of playing–for the fun of it. My only moment of glory–and I mean that in the most fleeting of ways–occurred while listening to an away game on the local radio station one Friday night in my bedroom. The broadcast went something like this:
“And Monache continues to struggle this year. Looks like their winless streak will continue … Coach Rice is starting to substitute freely now … we have a new wide receiver on the field … don’t know who it is … let me look at my roster … hmm … could be Harvey but I’m not sure …”
I bolted upright in my bed and laughed so loud Mom came in my room.
“What’s so funny?” she asked.
“The radio announcers think I’m on the field.”
She hugged me. “You’re first string in my book, baby.”
I guess you could say I was fickle since my interest in Lynn eroded after six months. It wasn’t as if I had my eye on anyone else, either. In my sixteen-year-old mind, it was simply time to move on. No more orange grove adventures. No more trips to the steamy hot tubs.
What attracted me initially to Lynn was her long blonde hair. When she chopped it all off one day, I realized our future wasn’t so bright that I needed shades. The timing of the breakup, in retrospect, was cruel. I look at the picture now–the March 1985 “Hearts and Flowers” dance–and can’t help but be reminded that I broke up with her that very night. I can see the pre-breakup tension in our faces. She wasn’t surprised when it happened–just angry. The picture makes me sad. She deserved better.
My bachelorhood lasted just over a month. True love happens when you least expect it, right?
Tiffany was exotic with long brown hair, brown eyes, and an olive skin complexion–half-Portuguese on her dad’s side. I passed her in the school hallways and knew that she was a senior based on her circle of friends. She was on the tennis team. She played the flute in the band. And she drove the coolest car in town: a brand-new, 1985, red Pontiac Fiero. License plate: FOOTLSE.
I had to get to know this girl.
Her tennis partner was a mutual friend, Paula Zaninovich. My inquiry began with her.
“Paula, tell me about Tiffany.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Does she have a boyfriend?”
“Well, she’s sort of seeing a guy from Porterville High but I don’t think it’s serious.”
“Why do you say that?”
“He has the only other Fiero in town. It was sort of an attraction of cars. Kinda weird if you ask me.”
Great. She liked cars and I drove a faded pink Honda Civic piece of crap.
Paula and I smiled at each other in silence.
“I’m going to come out and watch your match after school, if you don’t mind.”
Paula grinned. “That would be fine. I’ll tell Tiffany she has an admirer.”
After school, I stood in a small cluster of observers as the team filed two-by-two onto the courts. Tiffany strolled by with a grin on her face, her hair in a single ponytail, her tan legs long and slender, her eyes hidden behind a blocky pair of brown Vuarnet sunglasses. I hid behind my red cat-eye Vuarnets, trying to act nonchalant. In her collared white shirt, white tennis skirt, white ankle socks, and white tennis shoes, she was stunning.
Her serve was weak and her return, inconsistent. I watched in twisted humor as this gorgeous girl (and her partner, Paula) ran around the court handily getting pummeled by the opposition. Seeing that they were on track to lose 0-6, 0-6, I left before the end of their match. What a gentleman, concerned about her feeling embarrassed for losing so resoundedly.
The next day, Paula and I resumed our conversation.
“That was a pretty tough team you played yesterday,” I said, trying to sound empathetic.
“Not really. We’re not very good and we know it. We’re just out there to have fun. She wants you to know that she doesn’t have a boyfriend.”
“Bitchen.”
“And, she told me to give you her phone number so here it is.”
She handed me a piece of paper.
“Is this her handwriting?”
Paula nodded.
I slipped the small piece of torn paper–this treasure–in my pocket. Her phone number in her own handwriting. The seven had a horizontal line through it–even her handwriting was exotic. The phone number of that beautiful girl with long brown hair. The FOOTLSE girl. Unbelievable.
I paced around my bedroom that night, heart racing, palms sweaty, trying to work up the nerve to call. Finally, I punched in the numbers. The phone rang twice as my heart rate jumped to triple time. Sweat dripped off my face.
“Hello?” It was a pleasant woman’s voice, the kind you can hear smiling as she spoke.
Boom, boom, boom, my heart thundered.
“Hi … is … um … Tiffany home?”
Pause.
“Is this Thomas?”
Holy crap … I don’t know … is it?
“Um, well my name is Thomas but most people call me Tom.”
“I’m Tiffany’s mom and we’ve heard all about you.”
Boom, boom, boom.
BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.
My facial muscles twitched.
Her mom continued. “You were at the tennis match yesterday, right? Red sunglasses? Moustache? Kinda look like Tom Selleck?”
“Um, yes, that was me.”
BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.
“Yeah, I was standing right next to you. Tiffany’s at work right now. She works at Longs Drugs but she told me to tell you that you could meet her after work in the parking lot. The store closes at nine.”
“Really? Wow! OK, thank you!”
I hung up the phone and ran into David’s room.
“I’m meeting Tiffany after work in the Longs parking lot!”
He looked up from his Dirt Bike magazine. Urgent from the Foreigner 4 album played on the record player. “Cool.”
A few minutes after 9 p.m., she walked out of Longs wearing a white dress with blue trim. After two showers, and a liberal application of Polo cologne, I casually leaned against my car–parked next to her gleaming Fiero–wearing 501s and my favorite red Le Tigre polo shirt–collar flipped up.
“Hi,” she said shyly as she approached. Her voice was deeper than I expected. Deep and exotic.
No formal introductions were necessary.
“You play a mean game of tennis.”
She laughed, then I laughed.
“Yeah, right,” she said with a wry smile. It was bullshit and we both knew it. “You’re a yearbook photographer. I’ve seen you around taking pictures. You took the tennis team picture.”
“I did?”
“Yes, you did.”
We smiled at each other.
And that’s where my first love bloomed. Right there on Henderson Avenue, in the parking lot of Longs Drugs. April 12, 1985, 9:05 p.m.
We talked for an hour in the dark parking lot. She told me about her aeronautical engineering scholarship to the University of Southern California and her upcoming valedictorian speech. The girl was beautiful and brilliant.
I called her the next day, a Saturday, and after a few minutes of working up the nerve, invited myself over.
“So … how about I come over and help you wash your car?”
She agreed and gave me her address.
“I’ll be over in half an hour.”
After a quick shower, I pulled up to her house and she was already hosing off her car in the driveway. (I soon learned that her car was kept spotless–at all times–and the last thing she needed was help washing a perfectly clean car. I could have asked to come over and mow the lawn, or paint the house, or bake cookies, and the answer would have been the same: yes.) Her parents, Anthony and Kate, greeted me with loving
smiles.
Two weeks later, she accepted my class ring. Soon, a metallic clip replaced the yarn she used as a spacer. I loved the initiative.
One day after school, the coup de grace: She held out her car keys and said seriously, “No one has sat in the driver’s seat except me.”
It was one of those take notice moments.
I slid behind the wheel, started the car, shifted into first gear and …
The car jerked forward …
And stalled.
She looked at me like I had just kicked her cat, Pickles.
I tried again with the same results.
The design of that sports car, damn near lying down in the angled seats, was harder than it looked. After the third time, I managed to shift-up to second gear and we were off. That night I received my first traffic ticket for running a red-light–hey, the light was yellow when I entered the intersection! That bright red boutique car attracted a lot of attention.
I look at our 1985 prom picture and she is radiant in her ruffled white dress. Her curled dark hair sprawls over her bare bronze shoulders. A moment forever captured in time, two kids in love.
As the school year wound down, I was ready to complete my transformation to fully immersed Prep and the way to do that was to be on the coming year’s Student Council. But you had to be elected–it wasn’t as simple as checking a box next to “Seventh Period Student Government.”
I decided that “Entertainment Commissioner” sounded like the most fun. One other junior, Jenny, filed papers to run. She was tough competition–very pretty, very smart, and she dated our star running back.
Joe and I canvassed the school with flyers and campaigned to anyone who would listen. At the last rally of the year, everyone running for next year’s Student Council gave their election speech to the standing-room-only gym. After that, voting began back in class.
Over the intercom, the winners were announced.
And …
I lost.
I blamed it on the freshman boys. Of the group of people Jenny and I knew the least, it was the freshman boys. And if they didn’t know us–as a guy–I knew who I would have voted for. When in doubt, vote for the pretty girl.
Jenny was humble about her victory, and I congratulated her sincerely, but the defeat stung. Bad. Maybe I wasn’t cut out to be a Prep after all. Maybe time to break out my Sammy Hagar Three Lock Box concert shirt …
The next day, our president elect, the one and only Paula Zaninovich, stopped me in the corridor. I figured she wanted to offer her condolences.
“Hi, Paula. Congratulations on becoming next year’s student body president. How cool is that?”
“It’s going to be great. A lot of fun and a lot of work.”
I nodded.
She continued. “I’m going to need help and I need hard workers.”
Again I nodded, thinking those damn freshman boys screwed me!
“You know,” she said, “not every Student Council position was filled. Take, for example, School Board Representative. No one even ran for that.”
“I didn’t know that,” I said but the new information–coming from her–got my heart pounding. Where was this going?
A few seconds passed. We smiled at each other. It was almost like the awkwardness of asking someone on a date.
Finally, she said, “Would you be interested in …”
“YES.”
She started again.
“Would you be interested in being next year’s …”
“YES.”
She giggled.
“… School Board Rep on the Student Council?”
“YES.”
“Good. It’s done then. You’re on the Student Council.” She turned and walked away. “Oh, by the way,” she said over her shoulder, “I’ve never seen Tiffany happier.”
The culmination of many California high schools, just short of the actual graduation ceremony, is Grad Night at Disneyland. Throughout the month of May, the Happiest Place on Earth opens to hundreds of high schools whose students enjoy the park from dusk to dawn.
As soon as we walked through the gates, we knew exactly where to go: The Tahitian Room. Dinner and a stage show on a first come, first served basis. I was one of a handful of guys selected from the crowd to do the hula on stage. I look at the pictures now and it’s weird–the guy next to me ended up marrying Tiffany. Small freaking world.
While we ran for the restaurant, others (namely three of our varsity cheerleaders) ran for the nearest restroom. What happened next became part legend, part myth, and all gossip since they ended up as guests in the Disneyland Jail for the rest of the night. And I’m not talking about that cell in The Pirates of the Caribbean with the toothless pirate and furry little dog.
Didn’t know Disneyland had a jail? Neither did I.
These girls–popular, pretty leaders of our little San Joaquin Valley school–will remain nameless and forever innocent until proven guilty. Not the smartest decision to cram into a bathroom stall to snort aspirin. That was their story anyway. To further humiliate our school’s finest, Disneyland officials wouldn’t release them to anyone but their parents. So instead of simply sitting around for twelve hours waiting to board the bus back home, these girls had to call their parents to come get them.
Now.
Pronto.
Immediately if not sooner.
Porterville to Anaheim: 187 miles. One way. Up and over a mountain range.
We later learned that had there been a way to round us up, Disneyland officials would have kicked the entire school out of the park that very night. Imagine the overhead page: Will all the students from Monache High School meet at Gate A? You’re all expelled from the park and your buses are leaving in 20 minutes! Yeah, we know you just got here!
I guess they figured if the cream of the crop of our student body snorted white powder in their crapper, everyone at the school must be an asshole. Disneyland also took it a step further and served notice that Monache was banned from future Grad Nights.
Banned from Disneyland. That’s so much worse than being banned from Pizza Hut.
After an aggressive campaign effort from our school administration, months later, Disneyland officials added Monache back on the list of invitees. You can’t just ban an entire school for eternity due to the actions of a few morons, right?
1985 Fun Fact #2:
“Calvin & Hobbes” makes its debut in thirty five newspapers. For years I wanted a tattoo of the duo but could never decide on the stuffed or live version of Hobbes.
CHAPTER 12
For the second summer in a row, David decided that we’d take his modified farm truck to Walla Walla. We were both, now, licensed drivers.
But I suffered from a serious case of Love Sickness and suggested he make the trip alone. Having none of it, he agreed to wait a week–after my trip with Tiffany and her parents to Morro Bay to visit Tiffany’s grandparents.
In early June, with Tiffany and I, giggly, in the back seat, and her parents gleefully in the front seat, we hit the road.
We stopped for lunch at the midway point of the three hour drive, a large, roadside coffee shop. (I drove by it many years later and it was boarded up and abandoned. What a shame.)
The place was packed.
The mood was light and playful. Tiffany just graduated valedictorian and was on her way to USC, her mom was excited to see her parents, and her dad was just happy to be there–he was always happy.
Tiffany’s mom, Kate, thought she’d apply a little torture to her daughter’s new boyfriend.
“So, Tiffany, I guess we should tell Tom about Bruce. After all, you and Bruce have quite a fondness for each other.”
I stared back, not knowing how to react.
Tiffany giggled but said nothing.
Kate turned to Tiffany’s dad, Anthony, and pressed on. “Yes, Bruce really, really likes Tiffany, wouldn’t you agree?”
He smiled and nodded.
I felt my teeth gritting.
I thought, There must be a point here.
Tiffany put her hand on mine and said quietly, “Bruce is a black Lab–my grandpa’s legally blind and Bruce is his seeing eye dog.”
I exhaled in relief and everyone laughed.
These people were still strangers to me–and me to them–and it was a timeless moment. It was a magical feeling, the love and kindness–the acceptance–of these kind and funny people.
“Yeah, we sure love Bruce,” her mom trailed off. “We were at lunch one day and I looked down at him. He had a new collar on with a heart shaped nametag. I looked down to get a better look at the tag and turned to Nana …” (Tiffany’s grandmother’s nickname) “and asked, ‘does Bruce have a heart on?’”
Anthony started choking on his fries.
I looked at him, puzzled.
“Nana looked down, grabbed Bruce’s hind leg to get a better look and said, ‘No, I don’t think.’”
I burst out laughing.
I mean, I burst out laughing, raised my hand over my head, and slammed my open palm down–hard–on the table. Silverware, glasses of water, and empty plates rattled and bounced off the table with so much racket that the entire restaurant stopped and stared.
I looked around at the now completely silent, filled-to-capacity restaurant, and laughed even harder. Spit flew from my mouth. Tears rolled down my red face. It was, without a doubt, the funniest thing I’d ever heard. I have never laughed that hard in my life–not before or since.
Kate beamed.
We spent the weekend with her grandparents–in separate rooms under Kate’s watchful eye–and I met Bruce the black Lab. He was as endearing as Kate’s description–smart, lovable, and handsome. He still had the heart shaped dog tag, too.
Tiffany and I drove into San Francisco and spent the day walking around Pier 39. She bought me a stuffed animal–a small, yellow Lab (they were out of black)–and for an extra two dollars a guy with a Sharpie wrote “Tiffany” on the collar.