Bossypants Read Online Free PDF Page A

Griffin be Rosie O’Donnell by now? The straight boys quickly learned to be accepting and easygoing, and the straight girls learned over the course of several years to stop falling in love with gay boys.

    By August, I was coming out of my gloom. I took a free afternoon dance class where we basically just did jazz runs back and forth across the lobby. The teacher called me “Frankenstein Arms” because I would move my right arm in unison with my right leg, like a Frankenstein. Since I had been thrown over for a dancer, this stung. But I persevered.

    I was the youngest person in our group of friends and I always had a curfew. I was notorious for freaking out when it was time to go. It didn’t matter if we were at local eatery the Critic’s Choice enjoying mozzarella sticks after a rehearsal or at Tim and Tristan’s house watching Sleepaway Camp —the one where the demonic little girl turns out to have a penis—when I had to go, I would shut a party down. “Hurry up. I don’t want to get in trouble.” Pleated eighties Bossypants.

    When the summer was over, I had made about twenty-five new friends and was no longer weeping into my mom’s radiator cover. But most of the kids in Summer Showtime went to the Catholic schools down the road or were well into their twenties, so I didn’t see them as much once school started.
    After the Greatest Summer

    I had to take eleventh-grade health in twelfth grade. I had postponed it the year before so I could take choir and Encore Singers—it was kind of a big deal to be in both, whatever. I was alto 1, but sometimes they had me sing second soprano. I had a solo in “O Holy Night” in a performance at the mall. In downtown Philadelphia. Enough! Stop asking about it!

    The health teacher, Mr. Garth, had a thick blond mustache—the universal sign of intelligence—and a rural-Pennsylvania accent that made him say “dawn” instead of “down” and
    “yuman” instead of “human.” One day, in what I hope was a departure from the state curriculum, Mr.
    Garth devoted an entire period to teaching us “how to spot and avoid homosexuals.” I could not believe what I was hearing.

    I don’t know what happened to this guy at the Teachers College of Anthraciteville, but he had some opinions . “These homosexuals, they’ll trick ya. They’ll fine out what kinda music ya like, what kinda candy ya like, then they’ll invite you dawn to their house.” As I listened, incredulous, I couldn’t help but picture a young Mr. Garth being lured into a van by Paul Lynde. “Hey there, sonny, my friends and I were just going into the woods to enjoy some Jethro Tull and a Mars bar. Interested?” Oh, the shame that must have washed over Mr. Garth as “Minstrel in the Gallery” came to an end and he realized that was no Mars bar! But there was no turning back. He had already eaten half of it.

    My blood started to boil as he continued. “If you’re talking to someone and you think they might be a homosexual, just run. Just get out of there and tell the nearest adult.” I stayed after class to tell him that I thought he had misspoken. “I think what you meant to say was ‘child molesters,’ not
    ‘homosexuals.’ ” He just watched my hands move as I talked, not unlike a dog. It became clear that my school life and my Showtime life were separate.
    The Greatest New Year’s Eve Party of All Time

    The line between Showtime friends and school friends was breached on New Year’s Eve 1987.

    My Summer Showtime friend Brendan had a New Year’s Eve party. Brendan was a very dramatic boy who would say things to me like “Did you ever think that maybe the man that did that to your face did it to mark you so he could find you later in life?” See what I mean about the question being a reflection of the asker? When Brendan lost himself in a long dramatic rant, you could always shut him up by saying, “I like that monologue. Is it from ’night, Mother ?”

    He had a beautiful face