Game Time

At the appointed hour, I drive to the school, take my high-end leather briefcase and fabulous Kenneth Cole bag from the car, smooth my hair, touch up my lipstick and strut into the school.

The fat, dumpy secretary asks me to sign in and to mar my fabulous outfit by affixing a neon yellow, 3x5 visitor sticker to my lapel.

Umm, hello, 99% of the occupants of this building are under the age of 14. And I will hardly blend in with the female portion of the other 1% with their broomstick skirts and knit twinsets and comfy wedge loafers. Just showing up I stand out in the one-of-these-things-is-not-like-the-others department. I fill out the friggin' sticker and feign adhering it to my fabulous jacket. So sorry, what was your name? Beatrice? Sorry not to comply. You are welcome to chase me down the corridor to make me if you could pry your fat arse from your ergo-engineered wheely chair. But the safe money is on me. Even in the pointy little bitch on wheels shoes I'm teetering around in today.

McDuff comes out and acts all happy to greet me.

Stuff it, asswipe. I am your worst nightmare come roaring to life. You will wish the living dead had arrived instead.

He leaves me to get some last minute things while I scan the walls for signs of the Bullying Poster. I only have read it in headache-inspiring tiny print on an 8.5X11 page. I am certain it would be much larger in the classroom.

Not.

I spot one flapping in the breeze created by the oscillating fan behind Beatrice the Sweaty. It is just one increment larger in the standardized paper world. 11.5X14. The font would still give you a migraine.

Then McDuff returns and makes small talk as we traipse to the Big Principal's office. We walk through the corridor that used to connect the Junior High to the Senior High 100 years ago. My high school boyfriend (a year or two after Scott dated his way across the township and left for college like any handsome 18 year old would have done) had become a mural artist and had returned to our alma mater to paint a mural in the corridor. I wish I had more time to study it. The smartass undoubtedly painted in some hidden snarky references and messages I'd be sure to understand.

McDuff is naively going on and on enthusiastically telling me all about the rich history of the school. I tell him to stop, I went there a hundred years ago. And then to illustrate that point, tell him about the mural and my relationship to the artist.

He thinks it is Pat's father.

Really? It was the 80s. And hello, the artist's name is plain as day on the painting and it is neither Lars' name or mine. And artists usually don't have to conceal their identities. Anyone ever heard of a Nom de Paintbrush? I think not.

I clarify that it was a High School boyfriend, and at least 100 boyfriends later, I met Pat's Dad (and should have kept going) so no, the mural artist and I have no current connection.

He asks if it is bittersweet to see his work.

Do I look like I'm pining?

Umm, no. The Artist Formerly Known as My High School Boyfriend and I bump into each other at an occasional charity event in the city, and his mother still lives within striking distance of my house, but, geez, a lot changes in 3o years. I would not need to breathe into a paperbag at the sight of him. Where exactly is this office?

We turn a corner and enter a brightly lit office with a few plants and lots of paper. I am ushered to a chair and asked to make myself comfortable.

Oh, I am comfortable. Indeed I am. It is you, friend who will need to make the effort to remain comfortable.