Well, I’ve been busy writing other things. So I’ll share an excerpt from what I’ve been writing instead of this blog.

This comes from a part where I’m reflecting on my middle school angst. Names have been changed.

And what made everything worse was Spanish class on Mondays.

Spanish class was taught by Mr. James, who was a pretty laid back kind of guy. Not the kind of laid-back that earned respect from the students, but the kind of laid-back that resulted from him being so depressed, overweight, and alone that he no longer had the energy to do anything but sit back and allow two 8th grade cheerleaders (who were fake-nice to his face but behind his back made fun of him for only owning two pairs of pants, both with holes) to dominate class discussions.

“Can we talk about our weekends?” Lisa would ask each Monday. “Our fin de semanas? If we say it in Espanol?”

“I guess,” Mr. James would say, turning off the projector with his lesson plan, placing his elbows on the machine, and rubbing his thumbs over his closed eyelids. “Whatever.”

“OK!” Lisa would shout as though it was one of her cheers. “Remind me how to say mall again?”

“Centro de commercial,” Mr. James would say. “And if you’re going to ask how to say something, first say ‘como se dice.’”

“Si, Mr. James, si! Esta fin de semana va a centro de comercial con Maddie y Sarah y Jessica y Bailey y… Sam y… Jason y… Katilyn y…. Max…” Then she would look across the room to her sidekick, Maddie. Maddie was about a foot taller than Lisa and had much bigger boobs, but when you watched them interact there was never any question that she was the sidekick. “What else did we do, Maddie?”

“Ummm,” Maddie would loudly hum as she twirled her brown, curly hair with her pencil and gazed at Lisa. “Como se dice went to a party, Mr. James? Como se dice cute boys? Como se dice hot tub?”

The two of them would prattle on like this for at least half the class. Mr. James would rub his eyes and provide the vocabulary they requested while the rest of us sat in dead silence.

All I did on weekends anymore was go out to eat with my parents, watch Making the Band, and dream that I had a different life. I didn’t even want Lisa’s life, particularly. I just wanted Samantha back. I just wanted to do something con someone else again.

What the hell is wrong with me was all I could think during Spanish class on Mondays as I carved tear drops and flames into my desk. Como se dice ‘I want to crawl into a hole, bury my head in quicksand, and wait for the sweet release of suffocation’?