Verify You Are Human

There comes a time in every kid’s life when their mom stops picking out their clothes for them. When I was in the fifth grade, that time had not yet arrived.

It was early in the school year, probably September if I had to guess. The first crisp day of fall was still a few weeks away, and I showed up that morning in the outfit that my mom had laid out for me the evening before: A t-shirt and shorts—both dark gray and branded with conspicuous Champion logos—and a pair of brand new white socks. I sensed they were new because they were completely unfamiliar to me. They felt scratchy, constricting, and just plain annoying. I also recall that they were also incredibly long. We’re talking longer than crew socks; these came damn near up to my knees.

I had managed to grow accustomed to the fit well enough when I encountered Jay Not his real name, but not that fictionalized either. at the back of the classroom. Jay was—at least nominally—my friend, but he did have a bit of a mean streak. He wasn’t somebody I ever invited to my house, I’ll say that much. It was clear that something about my presence was offending him in some way, though I couldn’t guess what it was at that time.

“Roll your socks down,” he scolded, pointing approximately at my shins. “You look like a freakin’ whore.”

Truth be told, I was not mentally prepared to digest the majority of the words he launched at me. I remember picking up “socks” and not much else, which immediately sent my eyes darting around the room to everybody else’s socks. (The ones I could see, at least.) What was it I had done, or failed to do, that nobody or everybody else was doing? One kid had sandals and no socks. Another’s ended at his ankles. Long pants, long pants, socks rolled down to the shoe collar… Jay was actually right—I was the only one in that classroom with socks that went that far up the leg.

I slinked away to my desk and tried to bunch my chunky probably-cotton shame tubes up around my ankles. I hadn’t yet learned to neatly fold the elastic over itself, so it ended up looking like I deliberately padded my Achilles tendons with a pair of scrunchies. They brushed against each other as I walked, and were somehow even more uncomfortable than when I had been wearing them “properly.”

I remember it rained that day, so we couldn’t go outside for recess. Instead we stayed in the classroom and read, drew, screwed around, and most likely engendered resentment in our teacher due to the loss of her afternoon break time. I went to the bookshelf and pulled out the classroom dictionary.

This was not exactly a comprehensive inventory of the English language. Published by the same company that made the rest of our textbooks, it couldn’t have been more than a few hundred pages of not-that-small print. Part of me really believed I was going to find the definition of the word ‘whore’ in a children’s dictionary, and that part of me was also quite sure it could be found under the letter H.

Suffice it to say, I didn’t learn about the field of whoredom until a bit later. What I did learn that day, though, was a form of anxious self-criticism that still follows me to this day. It seems like every time I lay out an article of clothing to wear, I ask myself—sometimes consciously, oftentimes not—“What smartass comment would Jay make about this?” And if I feel like my imaginary Jay might have a point, I don’t wear that thing.

But the thing is, Jay wasn’t any kind of authority. He was just a kid, same as me, but with a penchant for turning simple observations into disparaging remarks. Jay was an asshole, and he is a person I haven’t seen or spoken to in at least 22 years. I don’t know why I still let his words, and more importantly his views, influence my behavior. I couldn’t tell you how many other Jay-like people have planted similar seeds of neuroticism and self-censorship in my head.

When I got home from school that day, I ended up taking those socks off and stuffing them behind my dresser so I’d never have to wear them again. That room was completely emptied and reorganized after I grew up and moved out, so somebody must’ve found them at some point. But I never saw the socks again.

Anyway, if I ever find myself tied to a chair in a decrepit warehouse with a movie villain pointing a gun at me while demanding I demonstrate my humanity to them, I very well might reach for something like that.