The day I learned the most important object less of my life started out much like any other.  I was at school, waiting for homeroom, being picked on by cheerleaders.  The gymnasium (as usual) stunk of filthy socks and Aquanet.  There are few things worse than being trapped on uncomfortable bleachers while bullies scream insults.

    “What are you wearing?”

    “You mush shop at the THRIFT STORE!”

    “She’s in Trig and she can’t even figure out how to fix her hair.”  

    “HA HA HA HA HA HA HA.”

Cheerleaders, thier ilk, and their leech-like hangers-on had consistently ridiculed me for much of my young life.  Jokes revolved around my last name (I got stuck with Vonhassencrack as a moniker), my nerdy glasses, my braces, and my (at that point) utterly unwanted intelligence.  To top off all of my extraordinary physical flaws, I also sucked at sports (a cardinal sin in Western Kansas).  Early in my primary education, I learned that anything unique about a person is a potential subject of ridicule.  I tried everything from permanent waves to self-deprecatory journalism to penetrate the sanctum sanctorum of pulp popularity –  only to be met with increased mockery.  “Don’t even try, you’ll never never be like us,” was the response to my every effort.  Each morning my mother told me that if I just ignored the taunting, my tormentors would leave me alone — never once grasping the irony that her mantra would be unnecessary if it worked.  At that point in my seventh grade career, my self-esteem been flushed.  I was sure that nothing could make me as beautiful, or as funny, or as popular, or as fun, or as utterly wonderful as those girls.  There was no winning.  I decided that if I couldn’t compete in the micro cosmos of Kennedy Middle School,  the real world was going to chew me up.  The “glitter mafia” had me totally convinced that I was a born loser, and destined to stay that way — whereas they were really going places (dental assistant training, mainly).  My universe was about to be completely changed.

That evening was the school’s annual spring concert.  Tim Schumacher, over wonderful  music director (who later produced  — on his trust Casio keyboard — such classic hits ad, “Baby Jesus and Santa Claus”), had struck again.  Our all-white middle school choir was set to sing “Jump Down, Turn Around, Pick A Bale Of Cotton” — complete with choreography.  Needless to say, the cheerleaders felt that they had found thier muse.  They were thrilled anytime we were forced to dance to anything, even if the bottom of the sheet music was emblazoned with the warning: “Negro Work Song.  I remember feeling like a racist little swine, especially when we literally had to “Jump down,” (read squat,  “turn around”, (spin on the riser), and pretend to pick cotton.  I tried  to refuse to participate based upon the amazing racism of the “number,” but Mr. Schumaker succinctly informed me that if I didn’t “get down” with the reso of them, I would fail mandatory choir.  He also wondered (after evidently missing the entire Civil Rights Movement), alout in front of a class of 80 students why, “people like you always have to rock the boat.”  This did not help my popularity.

The concert was set to take place at 12th Street Auditorium (yet another glowing example of Kansas’ incredible capacity to find original place names).  Basically the building was constructed like any other auditorium on the planet.  Red velour seats were arranged along a slope down into the orchestra pit, with a wide concrete aisle bisecting the seats.  Risers grew in the depths of the orchestra pit during our afternoon rehearsal, and the walls burgeoned with anticipatory excitement.  The tall gawky kids were forced to stand on the very top riser — a logical connunfrum I will never solve as this arrangement virtually guaranteed that the short students would be neither seen nor heard.  Our choreography required that we descend the entire length of the aile, performing our cheerful mockery of African American slave labor.  We spent three hours rehearsing, and having our jumping down, turning around, and picking roundly critiqued.  I went home and watched television untol my Mother forced me to put on a dress.  I tried to get her to call me in dead but she insisted that, “This is the kind of thing that builds character.”

    “Yeah, Mom, maybe if you’re in the KKK,” I remember replying.

After a brief, sullen car trip, we arrived.  I stoood alone, waiting to be herded to wherever I was supposed to go.  I was inevitably discovered, and forced into the girls’ bathroom.  The cahamber was full of girls getting ready for the big night.  The cheerleaders were so woozy with the prospect of upcoming glory that they virtually forgot about my existence.  I was able to watch unobstructed and they shared out an industrial sized jar of Vaseline — greasing cheeks and eyelids with animal abandon.  Up until that point, my only experience with Vaseline was in cases of diaper rash.  I had no idea that infant butt grease had cosmetic applications.  I was terrified.

Noises began to emerge from the theater.  BEcause this was a middle school production, and therefore hideous, the house was packed with angry mothers and fathers who would much rather have been doing anything other than videotaping some snot-nosed brat’s big moment.  The audience began to get quiet as the house lights dimmed.  We exited the bathrooms and formed our line.  The orchestra thrummed our introduction.  It was time to go on. 

Tall dorky students first, we began our routine, wearing near identical expressions of utter chagrin — even though our conductor kept mouthing the word, “smile” at us.  The great gawks made it down the aisle in perfect safety, and continued singing as softly as possible.  The medium sixed kids were doing a little better with the smile dictum than we had, and for a moment it seemed as though the concert would progress normally,  Then, disaster struck.  Suddenly, one of the medium sized kids was seized with a horrible case of stage fright.  He froze halfway down the steep aisle, but only for a split second.  Then he erupted.  Spewing puke like a locomotive belches smoke, young Jimmy Werth managed to coat the entire aisle in viscous spewage.  The kids directly behind Jimmy were smart enough to avoid the puke pike, having been hit face on with the sounds and smells of enormous expulsion.  of course, all of us “big” students had a bird’s eye view of the geyser, and were having great difficulty with our choreography.  The cheerleaders, however, were small in stature, and so obsessed with their dance moves that they utterly failed to see the puke pile.  In fact, they were so deep in concentration that they hit the mound at full tilt.  The first set of pink high heels to hit the puke began a monumental slide straight down the aisle.  The owner of the Barbie shoes grabbed the girl behind her for support, who in turn grabbed the next girl.  It was like watching penguins slide down an ice floe.  Coated in puke, they then attempted to run up hill through the slimy putresence, screaming and collapsing into a heap.  Needless to say, all of us picked on geeks who had managed to make it to safety were consumed with laughter.  Giggling as silently as possible, we attempted to continue the song.  This proved impossible.  People dyslexically turned the wrong way, or got stuck quatten in the “jump down’ position, prone with laughter.  The ausience sounded like a hog pen as parents frantically tried to stifle their own chuckles.    The beautiful popular girls soon completed their tearful, stinky retrat.  It had taken them several attempts to realize that there was an exit door three feet to their left.   Tim (Grand Wizard) Schumacher called us to an abrupt halt and stormed out of the auditorium.  We marched out the exit, and the audience began to roar.  This was perhaps the only interesting middle school spring concert in the history of the world, and they were hell-bent on enjoying it. 

I remember being sleepily chauffeured home that night, and thinking, “They’re not so special, are they?”  Seeing those girls shoot down a puke Slip n’ Slide finally convinced me that they were wrong about me.  I could have found the ecit.  I would have taken a bow.  I had qualities that they didn’t” grace, humility, and dignity.

Monday morning, the dynamic of the gymnasium changed dramatically.  No longer could those girls convince me of my flaws.  I knew what my flaws were.  I gave the cheerleaders the finger and moved on with my life.

Years later, I feel a bit guilty about counting the Colossal Cheerleader Debacle among the best moments in my life.  It isn’t good behavior to fondly reminisce about what was perhaps the worst moment in the life of another human being.  However, I’ve never felt quite as badly about myself as I did before that day.  I’ve always remembered that pride comes before a fall, and that the ability to laugh at oneself is vital.  Those girls in that puke taught me how not to behave, and the consequences of ignoring right and wrong.  Karma, it seems, is a bitch.