Day Thirty-Five, Upper East Side
One of my guiltiest pleasures is how much I enjoy having a reputation. Thus the highlight of my ten year high school reunion was learning that not only is the Class of 98 still regularly referred to as my school’s worst class ever (alleged comment from school officials to current students: “You guys are bad–but you’re not 98 bad.) I learned this from Anthony Aulisa. He was quite upset about the accusation and did not seem especially amused by how thrilled I was at our legacy.
Growing up, I always assumed that the, “You’re the worst group we’ve ever had” phrase was just an overused adult tactic to stress just how deep the shit was that us as youths had just stepped into. I can recall hearing it in jv basketball, altar boys, summer camp, in the local newspaper (about our neighborhood gang). But hearing that teachers and principals at my high school still use it for our class ten years later, it dawned on me: what if I heard the worst group over rant not because I discovered a verbal chink in grown ups disciplinary armor but because I actually was regularly involved with the worst behaved group of kids that particular adult had ever come across.
To make Regis matters worse (and again, to me that means better), my name has apparently been singled out as a culprit in leaving us with such a reputation. You see, on the final day of school our senior year, our graduating class participated in the traditional Senior Prank Day. Chickens were released into the gymnasium, bouncy balls were sent flying down the staircase, and “Fuck the Police” was played on cassette after confiscated cassette until Dean Dan Doherty finally pulled the senior stereo plug out of the wall. But the senior prank mission I was put on by some buddies I had stumbled upon plotting in the newspaper office was a little more sinister. I was given a paper bag filled with utterly rank dead fish and encouraged to spread it around the school anywhere I saw fit. In the light bed of the faculty elevator? Check. In the art teacher’s coat pocket? Check. Buried deep in between the stacks of the library (the day before school would be shut down for a week)? Check. I once read that the way we remember people as time goes by usually breaks down to two moments: the peak event we shared with the person and the final occurrence had with them. Apparently that last deposit into the school library has left a remaining bad taste for both me and my class.
Yet I am nothing but proud of it because I enjoy being memorable and I love being Number One at almost anything. Am I a sick person or do I just have a disturbed sense of humor? I wonder sometimes.
Tags: reputation
