Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Seeing folks you went to high school is a much weirder experience than I could ever imagine. You meet these people who you connected with in your most awkward of stages, and you have think you have this weird bond, when in reality, you don't know jack about them anymore. In my case, I was a quiet, athletic, borderline nerd weirdo in high school. I played basketball, ran track, wrote for the newspaper, and played in both the jazz and marching bands. I got no women until my senior year, and I had a core group of friends (including Kevin and Cliff who I am still tight with almost 20 years later), who I hung out with. My grades were just ok, which is sad, because I was very smart, but when that intelligence is coupled with a less than lackluster work effort, you have wasted talent. Yet I have no regrets.

I say all that to say, that when I meet folks via facebook, on the street or face to face, and they act excited to be talking to me, I am like, "Are you f**king kidding me? Its just me!" I don't have low self-esteem by any stretch of the imagination, but damn, reconnecting with me cannot possibly be that exciting. And these people tend to prove me right, because right after the initial re-connection is made, the forget about me, and our conversations fade into Bolivian to quote the great Mike Tyson. I like meeting and re-meeting high school buddies because 1) I am nosy and I want to see what they are up to 2) I am insecure sometimes, and I use their success/failure as measuring stick. I felt kind of pitiful typing that...

Speaking of Mike Tyson, there is an excellent documentary coming out about him very soon. The trailer is below:

3 comments:

Jazzbrew said...

Man, we were cut from the same cloth brother. When I read your words I swear I could be writing them myself (and probably should... my blog has really suffered lately).

I'm looking forward to that Tyson documentary. Did you by chance catch that HBO special on the Thrilla in Manilla about Joe Fraiser? It was pretty good.

rashad said...

I saw that documentary, and it was excellent. Like my boy Sabin and I were saying, it was nice to see Joe Frazier's side emphasized a little more. We get enough of Ali.

Jazzbrew said...

Quick follow up on Joe Frazier's side... for the longest time I thought he was just bitter but Ali was nasty to him. I never considered how it effected his family either. Really opened my eyes.

I know for a fact that I would NOT forgive anyone who did me like that. Ever. I can hold the hell out of a grudge.