It was unfortunate that I was in junior high, that most awkward of times, at the same moment that hair metal was the music of choice for my school dances.

School dances always followed the same routine for me. I’d show up and try to find a spot in a dance circle to weasel into, but the minute a slow song came on, I’d go off to the sidelines. Past experience told me that no one wanted to dance with someone who had glasses too small for her face and acne erupting all over her chin and forehead. Since every dance was exactly the same as the one before, I’m not sure now why I kept going, but one night I decided that my problem was I was too passive. I was waiting for guys to ask me to dance. Why didn’t I ask someone I liked to dance? Surely that could end my dry spell.

Joe seemed like a good guy. He was in my class, he was funny and cute, and when “Sweet Child O’ Mine” came over the PA system, I decided to take charge of my thirteen-year-old life. I really liked the song, dancing to it couldn’t be that hard – I was going to ask him to dance, dammit! To my happy surprise, he said yes. But as we were dancing a sudden tidal wave of self-consciousness came over me. I knew I looked like a Peanuts character dancing. My head was bobbing up and down, my feet were kind of shuffling, and I had no idea what to do with my arms. There was also a huge gap between our bodies. We could have passed an ice hockey puck between us, no problem, we were that far apart. Then it got worse. During the “where do we go?” part, another girl appeared next to Joe. She draped her arm around him and started dancing with him. When she danced, she looked every bit as cool as I wanted to look. I think I left the floor before the song ended.

When I got to high school I never once attended a school dance.