Faggot

When I was in junior high school I was, when the opportunity arose, quite obnoxiously loud and frantic. I thought I was funny. So one day we were supposed to split up in little groups, around one of several tape recorders, and make up a skit which we would then record. My friends and I formed a group and I, naturally, dominated the scripting. There were a couple of reasons for this. One, I thought I was funnier than everyone else, two, I was extremely domineering and pushy when I had the chance, and three, my friends were accustomed to this.

I had recently learned the word "faggot," and I knew it was a term of ridicule, but I didn't know what it meant. I suppose that at that age I could have told you what "homosexual" meant, but I didn't know what a "faggot" was. I just knew it was an insult. And, as I mentioned, I was a self-admiring, very verbal twerp, and that week or that day I was on a jag of using the word "faggot" as often as possible. Did I mention that I thought I was clever, and funny?

One or two people who actually did know what the word meant would quietly agree with me that fags were ridiculous. I paid no attention to this other than taking it as support for my hilarity. It did not occur to me to wonder, since "they" could be made fun of, who they might be. It didn't matter, I had a new insult and I was funny. It was in the middle of this jag of using a word I didn't understand, and thinking how clever I was, when they presented us with the assignment involving tape recorders.

I developed a skit where other people got to say things about 25 percent of the time, and the other 75 percent of the time I spoke dialog which always involved me shrieking the hilarious and oh-so-clever word "faggot." I was a complete riot of laughs. I thought.

My teacher, to his credit, once or twice made disparaging remarks to me, quietly trying to undercut my stupidity. "You seem to know lot about them," he said once. The implication was that maybe you are one. And indeed, if you were to put on your stereotyping glasses, I was the closest thing to a faggot you could find in that class.

Anyway, a few days later the teacher's gentle mockery of me sank in, and I stopped using the word "faggot" so much, not because I had learned anything about it, but because I thought someone might make fun of me. I recall, in that same class, being glad that we had erased the tapes and used them for other things.

By high school I did know what "faggot" meant, and one day when a big, tough kid had been ejected from his class I spent a long time calling down to him from our open window on the second story, calling him a faggot. After several minutes of this he threw a rock which cracked but did not break the window. I assumed he would get in a huge amount of trouble, but my German teacher merely said that it was my fault since I had been teasing him.

Oddly enough it was this same German teacher who once more or less called me a fairy. The story is that there was this totally built girl in the class, the kind who at 15 already has the body of Sophia Loren. Anyway, one day she got up from her seat at the back of the class and went to the front to get some paper. The teacher laughed and said, "When she walked to the front of the class, every single one of the guys followed her with his eyes!" I had not watched her, so I said: "Not me!" as if it earned me points. The German teacher then sang a short little song which I don't quite remember, but I think was more or less like this:

I don't like girls,
and I'll never marry.
Whoops! I'm a fairy...

I think I know the reason for that, too. The German teacher was young and hot. I lusted after her, and foolishly told my friend, who we'll call 'Tony.' Tony immediately told this to his bother 'Charlie,' who in turn immediately told the German teacher. It was very amusing for the three of them. One reason is because I was such a stupid jerk, and the other is that I was the shortest, skinniest, least sexually mature person in that high school. I was shorter than all the girls, for one thing.

After that, the German teacher wore many sexy skirts with brilliant white silk slips. She made a point of going behind where I was sitting and putting her foot up on a desk chair, then lecturing. The idea, I think now, is that if I were going to ogle her, I'd have to crank my neck at an insane angle.

Moving on with our story: Tony soon admitted that he'd told Charlie and Charlie had told the German teacher. I said that was jive, but Tony was all giggly and amused. Then, fishing for more, he asked me if I still liked her.

"Nah," I lied "She has knobbily knees. And she's old."

"Knobbily knees?" repeated the delighted Tony, memorizing the phrase for retransmittal.

"Yeah, knobbily knees."

Not long after that, the German teacher sang the fairy song to me.