Forty-five years, and this happened.

So, I’m sitting outside on the steps, as I’m prone to do, having a cigarette and talking with someone, when I hear a male voice behind me and to the left saying something in a way that sounds like it might be addressed to me, but I can’t tell what he said. So I turn to see who it is, and there’s a young white male maybe 18-20something years old, swaggering in my direction, all by his lonesome. Yup, likely addressed to me, then.

“What’s that?” I ask.

“I said, ‘Yo, dude, vote for me.’”

“Okay,” I reply, with some curiosity, “for whom am I voting, and why?”

“For coolest kid in America. It’s us against the girls. They have boobs. It’s not fair.”

“Ahhh, I see.” I didn’t. “Well, you’ve already lost points with me.”

“Why?” says Swinging Dick, more than a little defensively.

“Sexism.” I didn’t see the point in wasting big words or real effort. This was going nowhere.

“Huh?”

“You’ll read about it someday, and maybe you’ll understand.”

“You serious?”

“Yup.”

Consternation crossed his face, though I’m fairly sure he wouldn’t know to call it that. With a bit of awkward delay, he reaches deep down inside and comes up with, “You’re a tool!” He turned heel and started swaggering away.

“Hey, what are your parents’ names?”

“Huh?” Doppler effect probably helped him sound dumber, but I’m not sure how possible that was. “Doesn’t matter,” he replied. I think my question confused him.

Even though he was now swaggerstalkstomping away in a pronounced and aggravated fashion, I asked, amid a wave of bemusement coursing through my brain, “you in high school?”

His diminishing voice, among other things, I’m sure, threw back, “[unintelligible yup/nope]. I’m twenty-one.”

I sat there, somewhat stunned, and looked at my friend.

“That gets all of my wut.”

—-

Image credit: gurdonark @ flikr.com. Licensed under Creative Commons.