“Where’s your life partner?” asks the headmaster of my old high school.I’ve never been a fan of that phrase, “life partner”. It’s such an antiseptic expression, like how you’d describe your relationship to a homo-nervous loan officer.
“Under that tree,” I say. “He promised my Mama he’d take pictures.”
“We’ve got someone for that,” says the headmaster. “Bring him over! There’s a place for him at the head table.”
I was asked to come to Idyllwild, California, to give a speech to the graduating class about what life is like as a grownup. The most distressing aspect of that request is the implication that I am a grownup, which totally flies in the face of how I see myself every day. I’ve spent weeks thinking I’m in absolutely no position to tell them anything. I’m still questioning my presence as Preppy leaves his grassy knoll and takes his seat next to me. And then the Class of 2008 begins filling the amphitheatre.
“Oh my God,” I say. “They’re babies.”
This makes me very anxious. Whenever I have an attack of nerves before facing an audience, I become absolutely certain I have a booger in my nose. This thought invariably hits as soon as everyone is looking in my direction. I become utterly obsessed with checking for it, but because everyone is looking I have to do a series of brushes with my hand and modest twitches.
“What are you doing?” Preppy asks through clenched teeth as the program begins.
“I’ve got a boog.”
“No you don’t, you’re just panicky. Stop doing that. You look like you’re on coke.”
So I switch my interest to shuffling my notes and inspecting the crowd. In the front row there’s a cluster of girls sitting with rapt attention. Behind them are the cool artsy guys, sketching in their little books and occasionally glancing up. And in the very back, there’s a lanky boy in overalls and green nail polish whispering to his companions, who are all stifling laughter.
Ah, yes. There I am.
I was expelled from this school when I was seventeen. Afterward, I got a job and my own apartment. I didn’t even know how to balance a checkbook. I just did what I had to do, figured things out, and I kept working. And now, looking at these kids, I wonder how on earth I did that.
“So, please welcome our guest, playwright and columnist Topher Payne.”
Scattered applause. I stand, twitch my nose again, and walk to the podium. I tell them that everyone will say this was the best time of their lives, but that isn’t always true. I hated my teens. My early twenties were no picnic either, but things started looking up around twenty-five. I tell them they should enjoy the last few years of their parents paying for stuff, and try not to fuck that up. I warn them about bad relationships, credit cards, and coming out of the closet on Mother’s Day. I reveal they don’t have to go to college to succeed, but trying to do without it is much more nerve-racking.
I tell them high school provides them with skills, but they have to provide themselves with opportunity, and if they don’t there’s plenty of people who are hungry for it and more than ready to pass them by. So be ready to fight for what you deserve. That one took me a long time to learn. I hope they listened.
Afterward, a bunch of the kids come up and shake my hand, including the one in the overalls and nail polish. I compliment his color choice. I watch them go- kids released into the wild. And then my “life partner” and I head back to the bed and breakfast to drink beer and watch Desperate Housewives in our underwear.
I wish I’d told the seniors to value the moments when you get to do stuff like that, because eventually careers and life make it harder to take time for doing nothing with the people you love. I still don’t feel like a grownup, but I’m aware of the time that’s passed, and I’m learning to appreciate what I have. What I shared today didn’t feel particularly like wisdom, just notes on hard-earned experience. But heck, that may be all wisdom is.
