One of the dubious benefits of having a Facebook account is that I am able to connect with people from my past. Of course, if I cared about any of these people they would be a part of my present, not my past, but that’s another story. Thanks to Facebook, I have become reacquainted with old friends I had long since forgotten and relatives I never knew existed. And then there are the people that I really don’t want to claim as my friends but since it seems rude to delete their “friend requests” when they come through, I accept them all, with varying degrees of surprise, or suspicion, or apprehension.
The biggest surprise, however, was when I received a friend request from Sean, a classmate from high school who, back then, never hinted that he even knew my name. If he knew it, he certainly never showed it. The reason I had my doubts about Sean is because he drove me to and from school my entire sophomore year without ever, not once, acknowledging my existence.
During my sophomore year of high school my dad was dying, slowly and horribly, from stomach cancer and my mother had taken a job at Sears to keep the household afloat. My school was roughly 3 miles away from our house, but it was a Catholic school with no bus service, and city bus service in Fort Lauderdale was non-existent. Between a new job and ferrying Dad back and forth to doctors, Mom, harried and overwhelmed, simply did not have time to drive me back and forth to school every day. Without my knowledge she contacted Sean’s mother and they agreed that Sean would drive me to school and back. Although they lived only a couple of houses away, Mom offered to pay $5 per month for this service, a princely sum back in the 70’s when $5 would buy a tank of gas. Sean’s mother, a blonde country-club type, agreed without hesitation.
I’m sure Sean was as displeased by the arrangement as I was. Sean, a year older than me, had received a jet black Dodge Charger on his 16th birthday; he was an athlete and one of those Popular Boys who would eventually look back on high school as the best time of his life. Sean was Cool. Unlike me, he did not have braces or eyeglasses, acne or sinusitis. Sean’s mother did not have to work at Sears to support the family. Sean’s father was not dying of cancer.
It was unspoken but understood that I could ride (in the backseat) but must never speak or be spoken to. If I was not waiting in our driveway in the morning when he drove by, or if he got to his car first after school, he left without me. If he was providing transportation for several of his many friends and the car was full, I was expected to get out and walk.
I spent most of my time during those awful commutes looking out the window, listening to stories about parties I was not invited to and adventures I would never have. Feeling, literally, like a fly on the wall I remember wondering if I was really invisible and, often, wishing I was dead. The only time during that long year I was ever acknowledged was on the afternoon when the car was very crowded and a busty, blonde cheerleader, a classic “mean girl,” accidentally brushed against my arm: She recoiled as though she had been burned. “Move over!” she said, shoving me into the window.
Eventually, Sophomore year passed, as did my dad. My junior and senior years were not bad although I have never for an instant regarded high school as “the best time of my life.” And then, almost 40 years later I got a Facebook message saying “You have a friend request from Sean!!”
A “friend.” What exactly did that mean? Forty years later did Sean want to pool resources for a summer share in the Hamptons? Shoot some hoops on Saturday mornings? Have a drink after work so he could complain that his wife doesn’t understand him while I complain that my partner understands me far too well?
I wanted to take the high road, but I remembered feeling invisible because of that casual cruelty that comes so easily to some high schoolers, and I remembered the impotent rage I felt. I remembered wishing I was dead. But as I remembered the scared, lonely boy I was as a sophomore I told myself that I’m a grown man now. I told myself that I have maintained adult relationships with people who have treated me far worse. I told myself it would be churlish to reject an overture of friendship, and I told myself that I may be many things, but I am no churl.
I had just convinced myself of my maturity when I took a close look at Sean’s picture: a fat, middle-aged fratboy who exuded an air of smug entitlement. And then, irresistibly, I hit the “delete request” icon.
And deep inside me, my 15-year old self cheered.
