AC/DC "Jailbreak"

Here's how it went:  I would slip silently through the halls, doing my best to remain invisible.  I'd appear in her doorway, looking for sanctuary.  She would grab a loose piece of paper, from somewhere within her reach.  It might be from a roll.  It might be newsprint.  It might be a corner ripped off some instructions.  In pencil, she'd quickly scrawl an unintelligible line and say, "Come right back."

I'd present the piece of paper.  Which again, could be a tiny corner, or a sheet the size of a full newspaper.  Either way, her signature was only took up two inches of real estate.

"What is this?" the Study Hall teacher would ask.

"Mrs. Laganas says I can come to the Art Room for Study Hall."

"Can't she use a permission slip like everyone else?" the Study Hall teacher would ask, rhetorically.

This piece of paper didn't just grant me access to the Art Room.  Equally importantly, it granted me freedom from Study Hall.

Depending on who the Study Hall teacher was, Study Hall at my school was either a detention-like 45 minutes held in complete silence, or, perhaps worse, it was a kind of unrestricted social time, where the goal was to just basically keep the kids corralled for the period.  The latter was actually harder for me, as a teen, because I was horribly uncomfortable in all but the most familiar social situations.  I was fine among my few best friends.  But having to make conversation with anyone beyond that was an excruciating experience during my teenage years (which, if you've only known me as an adult who's profession is public speaking, you must find hilariously ironic).

So any opportunity to avoid social scrutiny, was welcome.

And Mrs. Laganas was welcoming.

If you had a free period, and she liked you well enough (ie. she knew that you weren't going to show that permission slip to your Study Hall teacher, then go to McDonalds), she'd let you come hang out in the Art Room.

So I went there at every free opportunity, found a corner to work in, and put my head into a drawing.  If Mrs. Laganas had a big class in session, she'd let me hide in the supply closet and do my work.

Sometimes, she'd have projects/assignments for me.  Perspective.  Figure drawing.  Oil painting.

But most of the time, I was on my own, drawing.

"You have an eye," she used to say.

I could draw.  Actually, I could illustrate.  I had this natural ability to look at a photograph or picture, and draw it exactly.

I wasn't all that imaginative.  I didn't paint from my mind.  I didn't even really draw from real life.

I drew album covers.  And Rolling Stone magazine pictures.  And Sports Illustrated photos.  Athletes and Rock Stars and Models and such.

For 45 minutes my head would be down near the table, my eyes darting back and forth between the photo and the white piece of paper.  And when the period ended, I'd pop my work back in the magazine, and head off to the next class.

At home that night, I'd be back in the Art Room---this time, my bedroom---head back in the picture, AC/DC on the boombox (which was, ridiculously, set at the absolute lowest setting possible so as not to alert anyone that I was still awake at this late hour, drawing when I should be in bed).

I'd be in a world where I drew the lines and I didn't have to say a word to anyone.

It was a sanctuary and a coping mechanism that got me though the long awkward stretch of youth.


Postscript:  How cool is it that I married an Art Teacher?  And that my house is about to become an Art Room?  My friend Mike Palmer (with minimal help from me) spent last weekend renovating our garage, to make a studio space, and my wife is offering day camps for kids and evening classes for adults, right out of The Art Shed (the site is live, but not finished . . .).


Hear the song on Youtube.

Motley Crue "Home Sweet Home"

I was so glad to read Chuck Klosterman's "Fargo Rock City," because, in a mix of rock criticism/analysis and personal biography, it explored some questions about 80s metal that I had had back, well, in the 80s.

Last week I was writing about liking U2, and how liking U2 (pre-"Joshua Tree" anyway) was not cool with the Cool kids.  No, the Cool kids liked Van Halen (which I liked, but didn't love) and AC/DC (who had a 1/2 dozen songs that were awesome, and a whole lot of dumb shit after that).

In the case of these bands, I felt like not liking them indicated that there was something wrong with me.

Then Hair Metal happened.

And for so many of the kids who had been preaching the liturgy of "For Those About To Rock," latching onto bands with big guitar riffs and lyrics about big lives and skanky girls, made perfect sense to them.

But in the case of these bands, I felt like not liking them indicated that there was something wrong with the rest of the world, not me.

While David Lee Roth could prance, there was no mistaking the fact that he was a manly man on the prowl.  Eddie Van Halen and AC/DC were just pure testosterone.

I understood why 15 year old boys gravitated toward that.

So what was with the bands of dudes dressed like girls, with pounds of make-up and huge, huge hair that had to have been fussed over for hours?  How did that connect to a hormone-driven teenage suburbanite boy?

I can't say that I could have articulated all this in 1986, but on an innate level, I knew it didn't make sense.

Beyond the make-up and hair spray, there was also some kind of cognitive dissonance about the music.

Plain and simple, Eddie Van Halen didn't play any fucking ballads, and Bon Scott would gargle rocks rather than croon a heart-sick love song (and probably did).

But these Hair Metal bands would put out a fluffy, hooky upbeat "rocker" and follow it up with some hokey Moon-June-Spoon weeper.  And while I was not a manly man, nor particularly testorone-y, I couldn't stand this maudlin stuff.

All this, to tell the story . . . whenever I hear Motley Crue's "Home Sweet Home" I think of this one guy I was friendly with.  A group of us were watching MTV, and the room was silent as this song played.  As it got to the fade out, he said, "Man, this is one of those songs that you wish would never end . . . "

Some of the guys nodded, meaningfully, in agreement.

I sat there, quietly imagining the pleasure of gargling rocks.


Hear the song on Youtube.

AC/DC "Back In Black"

Yesterday's post reminded me of my "glory days" of high school sports.

We had a really great basketball team when I was a senior in high school.  A few good players in my class, and a bunch of really strong juniors to create a deep team.

These were the days of boom boxes and cassettes, and somebody usually brought one to the game.  I think there were varying opinions about what song the team should come out to, and I'm sure it changed frequently, but the one that really sticks out for me is "Back In Black."

I can remember standing in that sweaty, adrenalized, anticipatory hallway, my own nerves jangling, not just because we were about to play a Big Game (I wasn't one of the stars or starters, so playing wasn't something to be too nervous about), but because I was going to have to run out of this darkened hallway into a gymnasium full of peers and parents, wearing what amounted to just slightly more than a bathing suit (1920s-style, anyway).

Some Youth Basketball waterboy would be tasked with waiting outside the door, and hitting play on the boom box.

"Back In Black" starts with the cymbal count-off, and I can remember hearing that and feeling the team surge forward, toward whatever thrill of victory, agony of defeat and possibility of my shorts falling down, lay ahead . . .



Hear the song on Youtube.