It's So High School

Katie shouldn't leave her school notes lying around when it's cleaning-up time, because then we review loose papers to see if they can be pitched, and then we discover that one of Katie's best friends, recently ditched by her boyfriend, feels like dieing [sic], but is willing to put this ultimate fate off a little longer once Katie assures her heartily that everybody else loves her, enjoys her company, needs her friendship, and would miss her terribly. "Like me," says Katie, who is a kind-hearted little soul.

"Okay, I guess," writes her friend.

Hands up, everybody who's glad not to be a teenager anymore!

But teenaged angst never quite goes away, does it? There's always that insecurity, that terror of rejection. You can put a braver face on it; you can let go of things faster; but in that initial heartbreaking moment of truth, the pain is every bit as awful now as it was when you were a 15-year-old poster child for over-the-counter acne medicine.

So in mature adulthood as well as in adolescence, it's nice to have friends who will run interference for you. What would it mean, exactly, I wondered, if a friend of mine were to offer to perform this service by me? Would it be that my friend is a guy, and the interesting object in question would also be a guy; so therefore, my friend's addressing the Interesting Object on my behalf in Officially Accepted Guy Terms™ would cause I.O. to don a nice big Christmas bow and drop into my lap?

Well, maybe not. But the intermediary acts as a buffer, which is logical enough. I.O. could convey his grateful regrets to my friend with a great deal less empathetic awkwardness than he might feel if forced to deal with me directly; and, if rejected, I could receive a rejection of unarguable intent, yet couched in the gentlest terms, from someone who cared for me.

If this weren't all entirely hypothetical, I'd pass you a note in 4th period to tell you how it all turned out.

Dating

When's the last time you asked somebody for a date?

It is, of course, an unbearably awkward experience. There's the phone number scrawled on a yellow sticky-note, under the name of a relative stranger with whom you know you have at least a few things in common. I dread the phone anyway, so that makes the whole ordeal that much worse.

But if you gotta, you gotta, right? So I pick up the phone and call. The person on the other end appears to be very glad to hear from me, but is on the other line with work right now, and will call back tomorrow. Fine with me! I'm just glad to get off the phone. Oh, but wait. Don't you need my number?

"The number you're calling from? Actually, it's on my phone."

Huh huh, oh yeah, I guess it is, I'm such an idiot. Is any of this actually worth it?

And it is, of course, because I get off the phone and tell Anna, "Okay, I set up your play date with your friend for Saturday," and she shouts "Hooray!" and hugs me tight, and bounces joyfully around the room for about seven minutes.

What can I say, I'll do anything for love...