“They’re Wrong About Us”
Even before we started running around together, Shelly and I were two of the most visible people in our high school. Heck, it seemed like everybody in town knew us: we couldn't go anywhere without being recognized. At the time it was a town of about twenty-five thousand people, and we had both been born there. Our dads were highschool teachers, so even when we were young, people knew our families.
Introducing Audio
Ever since I started telling personal stories on this blog I have wished you could hear them in my real voice. A better writer could convey more expression in prose than I am capable, but I find when I read them out loud there is more lilt and roll, rise and fall, and emotional nuance. It's more personal. For the past couple of months I have been immersed in learning how to do voiceover work, building up a home studio and learning editing techniques…
Human
I suppose I am a human being. I mean, that must be the assumption, right? I have always felt like a freak. I was frequently called "weird" and "a freak" growing up. I admit I have always been puzzled by the way people around me behave. They all seem to be in on a secret to which I have never been privy.
I bet my girlfriend that this picture of our cats could get 10 billion boosts on Mastodon.
She said she doesn't believe me. She said there's only 15 million accounts on Mastodon. She said there aren't even 10 billion people on Earth. She said it concerns her that I struggle to comprehend large numbers.
Let's prove her wrong everyone. Boost away and show her just how awesome the Mastodon community is.
Shelly’s Dad
Before I continue with the story of our budding romance, I want to pause for a moment to introduce Shelly's dad. I mentioned earlier that our parents all knew each other when we were born, since our dads both taught at the high school. By the time I was in high school my dad had long since moved away to the wine country along the Russian River, but Shelly's dad was still there teaching physical geography and driver's ed.
We Get to Talking
That first weekend is still kind of a blur. Drinking, making out. How I got from one place to another, whose house we were at, how I got home: I have no idea. Even at the time I was in a haze. But over the next week we began talking more and more: on the phone, at school. I remember kissing in front of everybody between classes.
Swept Away
Returning to that first fateful night after the show: the next thing I remember after making out in the bathrooms is riding in the back of someone's car. Shelly and I continued to kiss and hug. I was surprised by the thickness of her waist and the way my hands and arms sank into her when I squeezed, but I liked it.
What I knew of Shelly
I need to fill you in on what I knew of Shelly before that fateful night when we got together at a cast party. I mentioned that it came out of nowhere. Nothing in my story up to this point foreshadows it, and absolutely no one at the time would have pictured the two of us together. And yet there was a certain kind of inevitability to it, which became apparent to the two of us only gradually.
My Mom Gets an Unexpected Phone Call
"I got a very strange phone call this morning," my mom said. It was approaching noon Sunday, the 9th of April, 1978. I will always remember it. I was hungover from a cast party the night before, the first time I had ever gotten drunk two nights in a row. I asked her to tell me about the "strange" phone call, and she began, "Well, it was Shelly…
http://kirkwise.com/2024/09/13/my-mom-gets-an-unexpected-phone-call/
Low Quality Facts
Balutescu Marius Petrisor