1997.

As I said in October, I had graduated from High School that year, forgotten in a huge senior class at East Lake High. There was one quality I had, though, that stuck out which people may remember me by — my hearing was shit.

After graduating in June of that year – with about 25 percent or less of my original hearing, I basically did nothing. I was reached out to by no one and didn’t attempt it much myself because I was the wall-flower… I couldn’t hold a conversation with thanks to not being able to understand what people were saying (even with the help of a hearing aid). And at age 18? Who’s going to put up with that?

I sank into depression and my health deteriorated. This hearing situation had already led to my decision not to attend Flagler College in St. Augustine (where I had been accepted the previous spring) and now I was isolated and alone in a world I couldn’t take part in. My balance became somewhat less dependable than tuning into MTV and seeing a music video playing. I wobbled and swayed all over the place and depended on leaning where and when I could, onto stable and solid things… Anything to keep me upright.

that’s little ole’ me, circa November 1997

It was sometime in October of that year that I had an MRI performed on my head, and in a matter of days had a doctor tell me flat out that I could go to bed one night and not wake up the next morning. A 7 centimeter tumor effecting blood flow and cramping the brain will do that to you. Acoustic Neuroma is the scientific term to describe this, but the truth is it was the end of one life and the beginning of another…

It’s been ten years – not by choice, not by design, but by inevitability – that I’ve been deaf. Ten years since the natural hearing world escaped me and I was plunged into a more difficult version of society where one attempts to fit in while feeling like an outcast. Sure, I use a variation of the cochlear implant now (and have been for six years) and am doing quite well with it but I still haven’t turned a corner to make conversation easy to understand and take part in with strangers. I miss that the most…

It also doesn’t begin to describe the immediate aftermath aftermath — being trapped between worlds — a deaf person in a hearing world, a hearing person in a deaf world – where those around me refuse to adjust and demand my adjustment to them. Or being thrust into the paranoia filled bigotry of the deaf community where the hearing (or late deaf) were not welcome unless their commitment to the deaf life was total and utter.

Of course the flip side of this is that it got me involved on the Internet, which led to a job, which led to my web design talents, which led to a certain legal threat and a lot of pluses and minuses along the way.

10 years gone, and I’m still standing.

10 years gone, I’m still left wanting.

OK, so lets start with soemthing short and undetailed: I graduated high school ten years ago back in June.

Yup, that’s right, it’s been ten years since the summer of 1997 — when the Spice Girls were still somehow relevant, when that little probe touched down on Mars and shocked and awed the US and the rest of the world (OK, that was July… I’m just referencing the past here).

Well, next week will be my 10 year high school reunion from what has been announced over and over again to registered alumni on MySpace. Some people are out of this world excited about this. On the other hand, I had a former classmate tell me in person (and I am paraphrasing here) “I don’t want to see those people.”

Me? I’m the latter but at the same time, I’m a bit of the former. I’d love to see or talk to some people that I knew and were friends with again – touch base and what not…. Then I remember how odd High School was for me socially: not the normal variety of High School awkwardness that most go through but try being hearing-impaired to a grand extent on top of it.

This is where I should insert a colorful anecdote or two about social awkwardness without ones hearing — like thinking someone asking me if I worked at Publix was asking me if I supported abortion, or the time someone simply asked if I was going to a homecoming dance and I had no clue what they said and just guessed they wanted paper — but I’d rather not. Besides, both those aforementioned encounters were with people above and below the Class of 1997 and this is supposed to be about those people.

You know, over the years in my online endeavors, I’ve hoped to come across some of my friends or past acquaintances by chance and sometimes less by chance and more deliberately. I’ve hoped to hear from some people through this web site or through some of the alumni directories that I’ve been registered with… But mix in the social ineptitude from my high school days and you don’t have that happening.

That’s why darling, it’s regrettable, that you are so god damned forgettable…

On another note, I had someone else contact me on the night of their ten-year high school reunion…. Someone I hadn’t heard or seen in close to 19 years… An old classmate and friend from my childhood on Long Island (who was taking the same position as I — not attending her reunion). So my cynicism about people not getting in touch with me over the past does get muted just a bit from that. Not just that but it made me feel better knowing I wasn’t, ahem, so “god damned forgettable”.

east Lake’s graduating class of 1997 was somewhere around 700 — give or take — and only 75 are committed to the reunion. Me? I’ll be in Los Angeles and on a jet plane home during the reunion events next weekend – so nix the idea of me and my shadow being anywhere near this.

Of course, I’m not sullying those who are attending or those who wish to attend…. I’m not trying to knock high school reunions in general either. I am trying to point out that sometimes, the link to a past you didn’t enjoy isn’t going to be popular. And me as a link to the past tends to be highly unpopular.

She doesn’t seem to mind
That I’m outside my head
That neurotic is an understatement
And I’m legally insane

She doesn’t seem to care
That I’m vastly unaware
Of what the hell is going on
In the World around me

But that’s not to say
Her life’s a bowl of cherries
Maybe an upside down cake
It’s tougher then it looks

She’s never asked my name
Or said she doesn’t love me
Of course she can’t,
Because she’s flat
And living in 2-D

© 1997 John P. Fontana

Our time together was all too short,
You called my name, and I came running
I am an addict of your beauty,
I am the one who succumbed to your cunning

You called my name,
As we lay in the dark
I answered your cries,
Fed you with lies,
Man, I’m still here
I’m dreaming

There is not more to go on
This story has been told
I new the beginning,
Made up the ending,
While I was dying for a smoke

You wanted answers,
I wanted you
We reached forever,
Beyond the moon
I try to think,
“Why would she care?”
I’m lying still,
Your unaware

And still I am drawn
To your sapphire eyes
They see through me,
Except my lies
Now I come running,
I wish to touch base
I’m lying still,
I’m just a waste

And time is running all to short
I pledge to tell the truth – remorse
I give in to my thoughts of you,
I want you now, what should I do?

The darkness watches
As we lay in bed
All of our actions
Are just make pretend
“I love you girl, let the truth be told ”
I lie once more,
Let the fact be shown

©1997 John P. Fontana

Not only can this guy cover multiple artists (see below with his rendition of U2’s One) but he also looks way too much like me circa 1997 (or if I aged without having anything bad happen to me):

My GOD it is a gorgeous day here in Fllorida – Spring is very much in the air. The sun is shining brightly, there isn’t much of a cloud in the sky! It’s sunny! It’s bright! It’s warm! 75+ degrees! It’s perfect out there! I

But…

300 miles out in the Gulf of Mexico, it’s raining. Pouring actually. By tonight it will be overcast and for the rest of the week it shoudl be raining.

When did I move to Seattle? It’s been raining pretty well every couple fo days (for a few days) for most of March and February before it. In fact, last time I saw storm progression like this was the late fall/winter of 1997-98.

You know, the last severe El Nino year

I graduated East Lake High School in 1997 — I’m a proud Eagle alumni and I stand by my school…. Even if it’s among-student motto is “Where Eagles spread there wings and girls spread there legs.”

That being said, E.L.H.S. has a rival that I have always had problems with — not just because they were our sports rival, but quality of schooling and what not.

The rival happens to be Tarpon Springs High School — the venerable Spongers. (side note — Always felt cheeky about the SNL skit with the cheerleaders that had the East Lake Spartans, even though it isn’t a true combination of the two schools in question).

So what has lead me to write about my revilement for Tarpon Springs High School? There was a story in the local paper today about a TSHS student being suspended for circulating an anti-Confederate Flag petition. If you listen to the news, this story is starting to break in the mainstream (as I found when I did a Google Search on the story)… That being said, I relaly am sickened by the stupidity that surrounds this.

Back in High School, and Middle School for that matter, there had to be a dozen petitions that were circulated that were unofficial and not going to change what the school does or allows. No one got suspended over these things. Heck, they protested the Rodney King verdict at my middle school and all they did was make martyr’s out of the kids for standing up for what’s right.

I don’t believe Krista Abram’s was doing anything wrong. Nor do I think those who back southern pride by wearing a symbol of racism should be let off the hook for wearing the confederate flag on campus. I realize that some southerners wear the rebel flag and wave it with pride as a symbol of heritage and not hatred, but there has been too much hatred shown to African Americans since the Civil War to get away without being accused that the Rebel Flag isn’t a symbol of hate or cannot be interperted as one.

What also bothers me is that those who are so immersed in southern pride and southern heritage haven’t searched for an alternative symbol that they could wear or wave or show off… Something that shows pride but doesn’t have a malignant past,.

Tarpon Springs High School went out of there way to blow up this situation with Krista Abrams – they’ve effectively screwed the pooch by making an incident of this. Krista’s petition – with no offense intended towards her or her cause (which I gladly support) – would have waned and faded if it was allowed to circulate among students but not actually get anywhere (even if it did reach the school’s principle, it could have been said to her that there was nothing he could or would do). Instead? Tarpon Springs High School is now going to be under a racial microscope. Not just that, Krista may have hate brought upon her, those trying to express Southern Pride may have hate brought upon them as well…

The entire situation has become a powderkeg, thanks to the ignorance of the vice principle at Tarpon Springs High School, Wayne McKnight.

The last few days have been really exciting with the NASA probe American Spirit arriving on Mars, landing on the Martian surface and sending back images… It’s the first successful mission to Mars (landing mission) since 1997 and a great accomplishment for the down-and-out NASA space program, which has seen setbacks and accidents over and over again for the last few years.

And now The Bush administration is using renewed public interest in the space program to help it’s 2004 re-election campaign.

George W. Bush is set to announce plans for Americans (or humans in general?) to return to the moon and establish a lunar colony…. Also, he will propose a manned mission to Mars. In exploration terms and in the excitement of the space program — this is outstanding. In terms of sound economics and sound politics – this is appalling.

Make no mistake, I am a firm believer in the space program and believe we should be trying to expand our reach in our own solar system. I’m all for going back tot he moon. I am in favor of trying to reach mars within the next 10 to 15 years… My problems lie with the backer of these new space missions: Money. Where is it going to come from? How much is it going to cost? How the hell are we going to pay for it?

You see, George W. Bush and those in power have cut taxes, preached more tax cuts, expanded government instead of stream-lined it, have two ongoing military missions costing billions of dollars a month, have an ongoing war with a terrorist network that further saps financial resources. We have failing schools, degrading infrastructure, rising domestic costs and yet… Bush proposes missions to space that will cost half a trillion dollars or more when it’s all said and done?

Please :rolleyes:

The US is in an economic crisis of sorts and we’re prepared to keep spending? That makes no sense. Bush will not be implementing any new taxes, nor will he propose a repeal of his tax cuts from the last 4 years… Instead? The national deficit will continue to grow and the national debt will balloon and — soon enough, if nothing stops it — tear down the very fabric of this great nation….

Economic responsibility is needed now or we’re all going to get it in the end…

You know, I was just going through something or other on the web and I came across a little factoid that just hit me a certain way that made me laugh and think at the same time about a poem I wrote a few years ago (song Poem) and how true the lyric is, in a sad way…

The song-poem was Java Jungle which I wrote at Palm Harbor’s “Java Jungle” coffee shop years ago when I was still very much a lyricist and poet. The song is just rambling verse that makes sense to me and probably me alone in some of it’s meanings but has a little niftiness to itself… if you can find the rhyme scheme and what could have been the beat or what the music could have turned into with the song…

At any rate, I’m going to post the lyrics now – then I will tell you more about that “ironic and funny” little meaning I didn’t intend that I just found out about…

Sally-man say:
“Who led the way,
“Across the Great Red Sea?”
Way back,
The long way back,
Back home

© 1997 John P. Fontana

So what’s the big deal? Well, I could break down the meaning of each stanza and verse to you but some of it is boring and some of it – as I already alluded to — should make sense only to me (Mickey and Brand across the great land, for instance, is a reference to friends of mine who used to come down to be with family here in Florida, I would see them every summer).

The lyric that I found funny is one of the closing lines… I talk about Easter Day and St. Jude’s Parade and then make a reference to “Lennon Lad”. This is all talking about Julian Lennon. “Jude” being direct reference to “Hey, Jude” which was written by Paul McCartney for Julian during the time John Lennon was divorcing Cynthia Lennon.

The entire line was actually supposed to be reference to St. Crispian’s Day, I believe I had seen Renaissance Man not very long before I had written this poem and I was very fond of Shakespeare at the time after a year of his works being passed on to me through Ms. Ciccone at East Lake High School.

Well, St. Jude got worked in there and the reference to Julian was made — “The kingdom’s yours to have” and silence abounds… That’s saying that Julian could have easily followed John Lennon’s footsteps and gone to the top of Rock and Roll but failed to do so… Of course, Julian is still involved with music and still battles demons involved with his father and his childhood… That being said, there are reason the kingdom was never entirely inherited by him or by Sean Ono Lennon for that matter.

The ironic – funny twist that I keep making reference to is St. Jude. I didn’t know who St., Jude was nor did I ever think to find out… I just threw the name out there for the rhyme and for the reference (Jude, Jules, Julian) and only recently (reading another Rick Reilly article) found out who St. Jude is:

The Patron Saint of Lost causes.

So, Lennon Lad, the kingdom may be yours to have but from what the Java Jungle tells you, it’s a lost cause trying to inherit it…

Holy Cow!

The Florida Marlins have won the National League Pennant! The first time since 1997 have they accomplished this feat…

Wow — I am just stunned… I mean, I went to school with a guy who was traded from the Marlins this summer. He’s gotta be kicking himself now…

Congratulations Miami fans…. THIS team doesn’t earn my wrath like the 1997 “Bought championship” team.

There’s so much I could say here and so much I won’t … Take that as you will…