I used to get the shit kicked out of me in 1st grade when my dad forced me into Catholic school.
I was growing up in New Hampshire which was 110% white and was forced to wear a uniform to school and pray during class. The school was under funded and run by a priest of some kind. There wasn’t even a playground outside. Instead we got to run around for 15 minutes in the parking lot and, if we were lucky, allowed to throw a Nerf football around.
My family was from the better part of town while the school was located in the shitty part; a defunct church that, like those who attended, was in dire need of repair. The kids who attended were from the local neighborhoods whose parents forced them to attend out of proximity, not because of God. They were the misfits of the streets forced into grade school-daycare and they hated it. And a lot of them hated me.
I was tall for my age and, apparently, that called for an ass whooping. I was terrified to go there and felt helpless during recess as I was hunted down by kid-sized piranhas with mullets. Not even the teachers gave a shit. I actually looked forward to class because I was less likely of getting killed with a teacher watching.
I tried everything to make it stop. I hung out in a five foot radius of a teacher during recess. I’d pretend I didn’t hear someone calling me names to my face. I even tried to not notice my Nerf ball being throttled into the back of my head when some asshole stole it. I even tried to tell a teacher but she didn’t want to hear it.
She didn’t want to hear that something was wrong. Is this telling of hardcore religious people? I think so.
This one kid in particular was a real problem. He was two years older and was big for a third grader. He had a constantly red stained mouth from the packs of Kool-Aid he’d shotgun before school started. After all, he needed his energy if he was going to pry me away from a fence and drag me across the entire parking lot. I was terrified of him. I was afraid of his Kool-Aid power. When I saw him devouring a packet with hate in his eyes, that only meant that I was next. I didn’t even feel safe praying for my life because I was afraid he’d catch me and whip me with my plastic Rosary beads.
The ones who came to my aid were the only ones at the school who I thought were scarier than this bully: the rock guys.
I’ll always love those rock guys from the 1980s. The late 80s when monster rock was in full, head-banging glory. Before Kurt Cobain destroyed it with REAL music. To clarify, it’s not the rock I like. I hate that shitty music and its fake attitude. But I was a huge fan of the fans.
You know the type, those kids on the street who never want to let the glory days go: long hair, leather jacket, tight jeans, cut off t-shirt revealing tight white-boy abs, unlaced army boots, walkman with a Guns n’ Roses or Motley Crue tape inside. They were usually found in pizzerias luring next to Pac-Mac machines or stomping on cans in a back alley somewhere. Today, Rock Guy (as I like to call him) is hard to find but he’s still around, pumping Megadeth in his Camero and keeping it real.
So I show up at school one day with my dad. His attempts to walk me to the door to protect me never worked. In fact, the extra ass kicking I got because of dad walking in only made it worse. I waved goodbye to him like I was on the deck of the Titanic after seeing the actual movie.
I walked up to the front door of the school and quickly tried to get in. I was focused so hard on my peripheral vision (to avoid getting side tackled), so I didn’t see him coming at me from straight ahead. The bully grabbed me and before I knew it I was being gorged with my orange Nerf ball. It was slightly wet because I had left it out that night in the rain. It was like being attacked by a sponge.
Suddenly Rock Guy and his friends came out the door and saw what was going on. Rock Guy snapped into action and grabbed the bully by the ankles and ripped him off of me. Rock Guy knocked him into the brick wall and held him there while his Rock Friends looked out for Teacher. I couldn’t hear what he was saying but Bully tried to shriek away. Each time he fells to his knee Rock Guy would pick him back up and re-plaster him to the brick.
Rock Guy told the bully to leave me the fuck alone while hitting the bully with his own hand (saying fuck usually made me sad because of Jesus and all, but it suited Rock Guy). It was funny to watch because each time Rock Guy leaned into the bully his long hair would fall into his face and he’d have to wipe it back behind his ears. It was effeminate, but still hardcore. Between hair fixings I saw Rock Guy’s angry face. He was good looking but was in total rejection of it with his Rock style. When he was done with the bully he handed me my Nerf ball back and told me that the bully wouldn’t bother me anymore. And he was right.
At the time I didn’t know why Rock Guy did what he did. But I think I do now.
The misfit kids, the kids of the street, the ones who stay out too late and never seem to have anything to do, they all are ready to answer some sort of calling. Rock Guy, the self proclaimed outcast of society (like Rock Guys everywhere) loved doing heroic shit every once in a while just to prove that they still have a good side. Rock Guy wants to prove that Rock Guy isn’t simply about beer night and can crushing; that deep inside him is a knight in leather armor armed with a wallet chain that’s ready to do the noble thing if he can. Why? Because that’s rock and roll.
I was in cub scouts and other clubs and was always a loner, but I remember Rock Guys all over always being nice to me. Once on a trip to DC I wasn’t feeling well and one of the older scouts was told to watch me for the day while the rest of the group went out. Rock Guy took me to a mall and we hung out in the arcade. He bought me candy and told me dirty jokes and tried to cheer me up.
As I looked up at him I realized the irony: he was so cool, yet he dressed so bad-assed. I felt safe with Rock Guy because everyone else was afraid of him even though he was so cool. I saw what Rock Guy was on the inside. Rock Guy didn’t even wear his scout uniform, because those uniforms are gay. Nothing can contain the glory of Rock Guy, especially not a weak-ass handkerchief and a tiny metal loopy thing.
So, Rock Guy, if you’re reading this, or if you’re a Rock Guy somewhere and wonder whatever happened to those little kids that you stood up for…thank you. I know your factory job must suck because it’s unlikely that you ever went to college or finished high school, I know it seems like you should have applied yourself as a kid instead of playing too much Atari, I know that you know those glory days are over and that people don’t understand your Camero-driving ways…but I do. And thank you.