Climate Change

 Karl was the other round kid with glasses. I met him in the seventh grade, when being a round kid with glasses started being more of a problem. Fitting in during junior high turned out to be every bit as difficult as I had it would be. And every bit as hard as I imagined.

Karl rode the bus to school. I walked. We met in Cadet Band. He played clarinet. I played sousaphone. At this point, it had not occurred to us just how marked round kids with glasses were. That distinction was made clear once we made it to the gym. 

In elementary school I was no great fan of PE. The good news was that the stakes in those days were much lower, and being the clever kid the rest of the week was enough to keep my social standing. In junior high, PE was every day. And we were thrust into a world of changing clothes with our peers in a locker room. And that die was cast. 

Karl and I chose to get our gym locker baskets next to one another. Instinctively. We understood that finding a quiet corner might save us some measure of pain. The pain inflicted in this strange new world where dumb guys whose only skill seemed to be that of snapping towels. It was here that these morons were king. 

Karl and I were not. 

Once released from the torment of PE, Karl and I were free to roam about in the wild, conscious every day of the growing label on our backs. Not Cool. Being good at math or writing was not doing anything to save us. We were the round kids with glasses, and there was no escape. 

This was my seventh grade year. Karl and I comforted one another with knowing glances and the occasional lunch together. His company saved me from complete isolation. It wasn't until eighth grade that I listened to the voices around me that suggested that I try out for a sports team. I gave wrestling a try. This thrust me back into the jungle of the locker room, but my willingness to subject myself to one additional level of hell seemed to take the edge off the towel-snapping idiots. There was a measure of acceptance that I had only dreamed of in seventh grade here. I fit in. 

Karl joined me in this enterprise. But after a few weeks, he quit the wrestling team. He probably hadn't anticipated the level of masochism required to participate in junior high team sports. The gateway to being a "jock" was guarded closely, and not anyone would be let in.

Karl, being clever, bailed. 

By ninth grade, Karl had quit band too. This was a good move on his part, since there was a stigma attached to being in band. And being clever and round with glasses. Instead, he started hanging with the cowboy faction at our school, "the goat-ropers" as we referred to them. 

Karl and I lost touch after that. I noticed in his yearbook picture that he had switched to contact lenses. And wearing a Stetson. 

Nearly fifty years later, I wonder how we could have drifted apart so quickly. So drastically. By the time we were in high school we didn't speak anymore. We moved in different circles. Different orbits. 

But when I think of those days, I think of Karl. I think of the way we kept each other alive during seventh grade. I am sorry I didn't get a chance to thank him. 

Thank you, Karl.