Showdown: High School

I had a chance run-in with Kerry “Mr.” Moore, my old choir teacher. Mr. Moore is either one of Cyprus High’s favorite teachers or one of its most notorious. There’s no middle ground: if you had Mr. Moore, he is either the Pope with a cream-cheese frosted miter or a salt-and-pepper Nazi. As you may recall, I belong to the former school, so when I saw my former teacher I had to restrain from licking his forehead.

Wow, that sounded weird. Moving on.

Talking to Mr. Moore reminded me of the good times I had in high school choirs. I frequently maintain that choir is the ONLY thing I miss about high school – which should come as no surprise, considering my well-documented self-obsession. I’ve found a twelve-step group for that, so don’t worry.

Of course, now that I think about it, high school choir wasn’t REALLY everything I seem to remember. I mean, sure, I love being onstage (re: self-obsessed), but… well, in choir, we had to wear uniforms. When I was in show choir, we wore purple tuxedo shirts and suspenders. PURPLE TUXEDO SHIRTS!!! SUSPENDERS!!!

I’m pretty sure the purple tux shirt wouldn’t be a good look for ANYBODY.

So anyway, that got me thinking: Is the “real world” actually better than high school? To untangle this particular Gordian knot, I need to turn to the dark and unholy art of “science” and analyze my own life, point by point, to see if I’m better off NOW than I was then.

We’ll start with The Stage, since that’s what got me on this particular topic.

Okay, so the purple tux shirt? Bad news. However, when you consider one of my more recent turns on the stage – this past winter’s Taming of the Shrew:

Okay, so the purple is bad, but… dang. That moustache has a life of its own. A hideous life, gifted to it by Satan. Advantage high school.

Responsibility

Forty hours a week is a lot of time to devote to anything. Now, if it’s something you enjoy and, moreover, CHOOSE to do (like, say, build a scene-by-scene reenactment of The Prestige out of Legos) then it’s time well-spent. If, however, higher powers mandate your involvement, then you become resentful.

School’s a beast, because by law young teens are required to attend every day. Even once we reached sixteen years old, most of us still had our parents harping on us to go to school and do well. Not only that, but, thanks to homework, our full-time obligations followed us home. At least, with a full-time job, when we leave work, we can generally LEAVE WORK and do whatever the heck we want with out time.

However, when you consider what happens if you fail to live up to your responsibilities, the picture becomes a bit clearer. In high school, if you skip class or get bad grades, you get grounded from the Nintendo – which you probably wouldn’t have time for anyway if you DID your homework, so you’re out nothing. If you skip work, you don’t get your paycheck, you get fired, you fail to find a new job due to a struggling job market… in short, you DIE. Advantage high school.

Music

Understand I was raised on a steady diet of show tunes, Manheim Steamroller and other inoffensive pearls of “easy listening” goodness. There was, in fact, a time that I thought John Tesh didn’t suck. In high school I started to come out of that phase, discovering that music had an edgy side. An edgy side embodied by Savage Garden and Matchbox 20.

(By the way, I still love Matchbox 20 and Rob Thomas. So, on behalf of all Matchbox 20 fans, I apologize profusely for “Her Diamonds.” Man, there’s NO excuse for that song)

Well, since then, I’ve continued to explore the wonderful world of music, and I’ve made two important discoveries.

1 - Andrew Lloyd Weber is a hack.
2 – It is physically impossible for me to listen to The Offspring and not rock the $#@% out.

Advantage real world.

Social Life

My high school friends were all inexcusable dorks. We played fantasy board games, clocked absurd hours on video games, and treated every single instance of life failing to meet our expectations like Chernobyl. Of course, now that we’ve all grown up… we’re exactly the same. Except now, half of us have babies. Crying, peeing, puking babies. Advantage high school.

Romance

In high school, dating was nice. I never felt pressured by the prospect of going on a date with a girl: there was no obligation, no sense of commitment, other than to have fun. Now, if I ask a girl out on a single date, I feel like I had better have De Beers on frickin’ speed dial. So, of course, I don’t ask anyone out… which means that I feel absolutely no pressure. Draw.

Conclusion:

So the final count:

High School: 3
Real World: 1

And so the winner is…

THE REAL WORLD

Because I love The Offspring just that much.