High . . . School . . .

This morning I dropped off my younger brother at his new high school. Not just a new high school because he’s a freshman, but a new high school because it was just finished this summer. My little brother is going to a two-story, two-football-field, pool-depth-adjusting, actual-farming-for-the-farm-kids high school. In this time of budget crisis in schools all over the U.S., it’s great to know that Saline is willing to waste the money on a new pool that can change depth while laying off teachers. Thanks, Saline!

But he’s starting high school next Monday. Where did the time go? How is it that he went from a newborn baby grasping my finger the morning after he was born to a freshman in high school who stands a very good chance of being valedictorian (had Saline one) in four years? How’d he go from being the kid I could sweep up into my arms and carrying him around on my hip to being a kid who could beat me up without breaking a sweat? So this is what empty nest syndrome feels like.

Seriously, though, it’s a shame my little brother won’t go to my high school (yes, in Saline). C’mon, the weirdly shaped school with the odd angles, with the old chairs, musty auditorium and too-small lunchroom was perfect. Who wouldn’t want to learn in a place where desks were placed on top of one another for the purposes of saving space?

Of course, I exaggerate. About the condition of the school, but not about my experience in that school. I can honestly say that those four years were probably the worst years of my life. I’ve never felt so obviously demeaned yet glaringly invisible at one. I urged the time to pass, pass fast, but alas, the four years took exactly four years. I squirmed throughout high school, hating almost everyone in my class (sometimes even my friends) and hoping to God that this wasn’t it. That theory was both confirmed and debunked when I saw one of the more popular girls in my school walking around the U-M campus two years later clad in a Saline High School class t-shirt. It wasn’t it for me, but for some of them, it was. Heh. Heh.

I don’t wish any of this on my brother, but I of course know that it’s probably not always going to be smooth sailing. Smart as he is, popular as he is (with his peers and with the ladies), I know that it won’t always be easy. I’ve heard it said that even the popular kids feel awkward during high school, and my little brother is already exhibiting signs that this is true. While he doesn’t approach jock legendary fame, he’s got the smart, sensitive popular kid corner staked out, intentionally or not. Already the pressure of being well-liked (how many times have we seen girls shriek his name enthusiastically when they saw him?) is showing itself; he has to have nice clothes, he has to keep on being the brightest, he has to have all the answers for everyone. He has to be the charming talker. It’d be nice to say that high school is a breeze when you’re a popular kid (I wouldn’t know), but he doesn’t make it seem like it’s a breeze. He’s confessed he’s a bit nervous about the following four years – not only in terms of academics, but in terms of the social hierarchy. What if he trips up somewhere, somehow?

Of course, some of the dread he’s feeling can be attributed to the venomous reactions of his two older sisters and older brother when the words “high” and “school” are placed next to one another. I would be lying if I said I hadn’t told him that high school’s a bitch. I’ve let him know that he’ll probably have it easier than we did, but that’s not assured. Besides our less than positive reactions, he also fears that high school will rot his brain with useless information even as he struggles to achieve distinction in the sciences. I told him that these four years go by, but not exactly fast – it’s the next four years after that pass by like a breeze, pass by so fast that you’re left weeping with sorrow when you graduate from college. “But I want to party more!”

Kidding. In my case, it was the “I want to write more papers about John Milton and William Shakespeare and Geoffery Chaucer and the anonymous lyricists!” line that got sobbed into the carpet.

As I dropped him off this morning, I realized that he’s entering another stage in his life that will not be easy, that will probably not be memorable (at least, if he’s levelheaded it won’t be memorable). He’s going through four years of monotony, four years of approaching adulthood yet still being treated like a child, four years of playing the social ladder game with jocks, preps and nerds. I’m not envious of what he’s about to do; all I can hope for is that it’s less difficult for him than it was for me. I hope that, after this ends, he gets to the point where he only thinks about high school if someone near him is about to embark on that trail. I can only hope that he’s not wearing a Saline High School class t-shirt when he’s studying at MIT, lonely and depressed because he’s not popular in college (who the fuck is?). I can only hope that these four years actually do go by a little faster for him.

I’d like to save him from any pain high school has in store for him, but I can’t. I’d like to transport him through these probably crappy years at the speed of light, but I can’t. I’d like to have him enroll in college already, but I can’t do that for him. I’ll wish him well, then, and tell him to simply be himself. Yeah, not exactly advice heeded by youth, but if he does that he’ll be much happier with himself in the end. Maybe it won’t gain him popularity points, but he doesn’t need those if he doesn’t stay true to himself.

Big sigh.

I can only hope that he becomes a baby again, magically, so that I can carry him one last time.

That’s not going to happen, is it?