Once I’d been through the first few weeks of high school at Killarney Secondary and was able to find my way around, I did feel a bit more comfortable. It was still weird though, coming from an elementary school of a few hundred kids where you were in the senior grade, to being in the lowest grade in a giant school of over 1800 kids.
High school stood out to me for its physical factors: the closeness of the air, and the noise and the utterly sour stink of a thousand loud, sweating teens. The whole school had that sour funk about it, everywhere.
Maybe I had some kind of mild claustrophobia, because it all felt too big for me. Maybe I had some mild paranoia too, because I was sure that I was somehow telegraphing my inner worries out there for all to see. I swear that I’d really did hear my name “John” spoken every time I walked down a crowded hallway. It absolutely wasn’t though – it’s just what a nervous, self-conscious young person experiences.
In my first week of Grade 8, I remember walking down a crowded hallway, and having my eyes pulled to the right by the sight of one of the most pretty brunette girls I’d ever seen. She had lightly curled dark hair parted in the middle, going down well past her shoulders. I guess she must have been a senior student.
It was one of those slow-motion, music in the background, micro-moments that you see on TV. Anyway, I must have been staring at her like a jackass, because her cheeks went rosy as she smiled at me, blushed, and looked down at her hands. I realized that she’d seen me staring at her, and I’d actually embarrassed her! Only then did I realize what a goon I must have been: a goofy, skinny little eighth-grader in a turtle-neck, gawking at a beautiful senior high school girl.
But still, the fact that I’d made a girl react to me, even inadvertently, felt kind of breathless. Maybe it wasn’t so bad to be around older kids after all, or maybe it was just my hormones kicking up their heels.
My self-confidence came and went, to say the least, but within a few weeks I was finding my way around and feeling more at ease in the big school and its endless turning hallways. Over time, I learned that I could rely on myself, although I preferred to keep to myself most of the time, or hide in the anonymity of large crowds.
Grade 8 was maybe harder on some of my friends than I realized. Big Vince Lamarre had been a good friend of mine through Grades 5 and 6 back at MacCorkindale Elementary, but I’d only seen him once in the hallways of Killarney High. I saw him briefly at a locker on the first floor hall near the front office. He was getting something from his locker and we saw each other from a distance, and then he left. I didn’t seen him again after that.
In the first half of Grade 8, I caught the chicken pox and had to stay home for a week or two. It was both miserable and a nice break. I itched all over with red welts and felt nauseous some of the time, especially when my Dad had me strip down in the living-room so he could dab calamine lotion everywhere. I would literally feel my gorge rising and want to barf right there while Dad was dabbing away. I just held my breath and counted each second until I could pull my pyjama bottoms back up and lope up to my room, in relief. But even if I didn’t like it at the time, I’ve understood since that my Dad was taking good care of me, even if it was incredibly embarrassing.
On the positive side, my chicken pox absence provided me with a welcome chance to live in my head and enjoy hours of solitude. I drew countless spaceships, stars, and rocket blasts, while making “pew pew” sound effects to myself. I listened to my radio (either CKLG or CFUN), read Superman and Batman comics, and tried to draw myself as a superhero, complete with my own chest emblem – maybe a heart with a “J” inside it.
When I finally returned to school, I’d fallen behind in one class to the point where I might even fail it. I was given assignments to help make up the difference. I’d never ever worried about failing a subject in school before – it was quite a shock to me – but I did the exercises and ended up just squeaking by.
