teenagery

Last night I caught The Factory Theater's send-up of (a segment) of 80's pop culture Hey! Dancin'!

While it wasn't entirely my cup of comic tea, there was a lot of fun and funny being thrown down onstage. Some stuff worked tremendously well, other stuff...eh, not so much for me.

The costuming was outrageously gaudy to the point that I recoiled in my own brain remembering a certain pair of leg warmers I tried to pull off. ONCE. Noah Simon was pitch perfect as the cable access station manager and Dominque Johnson as Princess (a devotee of Prince circa "Purple Rain") reminded me of one of my friends who embodied the same fervent spirit...along in my friend's case, she was devoted only to Cindy Lauper.

I also enjoyed the dry-humping quite a bit as I'm sure it will be a while before I get that slice of physical slapstick scrubbed out of my head.


What didn't work for me was the "screaming as acting" school of theater that some of the cast obviously attended. Some of the piercing delivery hit the mark, mostly though, it just kind of flat lined for me after a very short while. Oofie.

Overall, it was like watching a bit of collective history through a wildly colorful and overtly stereotypical kaleidoscope.

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As I waited for the bus, thinking about the show and how being a teenager was so vastly naive and tame to being one now, a conversation I had on the phone with my sister just a few hours before the show slams into my brain.

Yesterday, my nephew was punched in the mouth by a bully.

This is one of those seemingly typical bullies who pushes and shoves and verbally abuses many of his classmates. While my nephew has had run-ins with this kid before, yesterday was different.

This kid walked up to my nephew in the middle of a crowded hallway, shoved him and said, "Hit me. I dare you to hit me!" My nephew said no, he wasn't doing that....and the bully socked him in the mouth.

When he was reported to teachers by other students, the bully went AWOL from school grounds.

This was not the first time this kid has pushed or yelled at my nephew, but it was the first time he hit him.

After being called about the incident, my sister went to the school to find out exactly what had happened. The school admitted this was not the first time the kid had hit someone. While the school called the police regarding the truancy...they did not report the hitting/assault.

My nephew's mouth was swollen and bleeding - due in part, I'm sure to his braces. (As someone who wore braces, I can only imagine how much getting punched in the mouth must hurt.)

My sister decided that, had it been the first time this kid hit someone, she would have let it go and let the school handle it. But, because this was an ongoing situation and he had hit other kids and it was now escalating with her son, she decided to file a report with the police.

Her reasoning being that the kid needed help - and by ignoring this behavior and letting it slide, the school (and possibly his parents) was letting the cycle continue and build. By filing an assault report, the kid might be forced to get some counseling to deal with his anger or whatever is causing him to lash out at other kids.

The police took pictures of my nephews injuries, made a report and acknowledged to my sister that this is a kid whose name is familiar to them.

The only way for bullying to stop is when parents and the community step up.

The schools will not take on the responsibility, nor should it fully lie at their feet.

Much of the time, the outcome of bullying is damaged kids.
It's damaging to the victims, the witnesses and the bullies themselves.

More often than it should, it ends tragically.

On a positive note, and the thought I just can't get out of my head is how impressed I am with my nephew. He's not a scrawny, fearful little kid. He could have easily mirrored the anger that was being directed at him and, in the name of self-defense, hit back. But, he didn't.

When his friends asked him why he didn't defend himself he said, "Getting in a fight would get me an automatic suspension. He's not worth it. I want to be in school."

My nephew isn't a boy scout. He'll sneak phone calls to girls when he's grounded from the phone. He fib about chores that haven't been finished.

That boy will tell you whatever you need to hear...if it will result in consumption of a pepperoni pizza.

But, lately, when it comes to showing us the kind of character you dig down deep for, my nephew has really stepped up and shown that, as goofy a kid as his still is, he is growing into a responsible and thoughtful adult.

I'm very proud to know him.