Expansion

I grew six inches between 7^th and 8^th grade, and stopped at 5’9”. I have never grown again, oddly. I had my first decent girlfriend experience. Her name was Amber Posatko. Amber’s dad was a lawyer, and they were pretty well off. Her mom was, near as I could tell, an eccentric housewife. Amber was quirky, bright, eccentric and, compared to most of her Back Mountain peers, a bit exotic. Amber and I bonded over our love of music.

I’d shared a bedroom with Matt my whole life, but the summer before 8^th grade, my sister Barbara went to Pennsylvania Governor’s School for the Arts. She had a magical creative summer with a group of promising young artists from across the state. And I got to take over her room for a summer. I dove into Barb’s tapes (she was 17) and discovered U2, Tori Amos, R.E.M., Suzanne Vega and a host of other independently-minded musicians. That music began to expand my world, in a creative sense.

That summer I also got contacts. Years of day-old greasy sweat grime formulating on the backside of plastic nosepads digging into my face, a cesspool for zits and a red badge of nerdity, was gone, gone, finally gone. I could be something else. While my shins ached I would lay out on the antique double bed in Barb's room and draw my own made up comic book characters while Bono and the Edge rattled and hummed in my ears.