Huh.....

A little story from my past...

When I was 17 my parents found out that I was mixed up in a bad crowd. We had just moved to Colorado Springs and it was my first time attending a huge public high school. I don’t know about you but when I’m in that situation, and being a military brat t’was the case quite often, you tend to not be choosy when picking your first friends in a new place. Initially you want anyone. Anyone! Just someone who will at least sit with you in the enormous cafeteria during lunch. Feeling like a lonely dumb ass on the first day at a new school was just not fun.

When I went looking for a friend that first day of school - I reached out and found Melissa. Melissa was in my English class. Melissa had been emancipated from her parents, after a long stretch of physical and sexual abuse, at 15. Melissa was married to an Army guy who was stationed at Ft. Carson and they had their own apartment. My “cool alarm” went a WILD! Wild I tell you! All I could think about was how lucky she was to be A) married at 17 B) lived in her own apartment and C) legally separated from her parents all while being in high school! I’d wanted those things since the day I was born!

It didn’t take long for my size 6 sweet-ass to become popular with all of Melissa’s husband’s Army buds. Upon meeting the entire lot of them I had steadfast friendships, cigarettes, which I was not yet old enough to buy for myself, beer, which I was not yet old enough to buy for myself, and a boyfriend. A boyfriend who wore a military uniform and drove a convertible, no less! Again, my cool alarm was singing, “ALERT! ALERT! YOU ARE THE COOLEST EVER, JESS!”

Shortly there after I smoked my first joint. It turns out Melissa and the Ft. Carson chemical company were all a bunch of druggies. Yes…yes…there went that fucking alarm - screaming out about my coolness again. Smoking pot was against my parents rules. It was against my Lizzy's' wishes, and more important to me at the time - NOT something that an officers kid would do! … Oh but she did. And she loved it.

Come springtime, my parents had discovered my nasty little secret about boys and drugs. One night I lied and said I was going to a friends house, when instead I took my parents car (“stole” it) and drove to Ft. Carson. At some point my Mom got suspicious and called the friends house to check up on me. I wasn’t there and that is when the shit hit the fan. I was ordered by my parents to stay out of Ft. Carson forever and I was not to drive within five miles of that Army base or ELSE. On top of that I was grounded for what seemed like forever.

For a few months after that the Army guys treated me like I was a leper. The chance they took by having an underage girl in the dorms, combined with the drugs we were all trying to get away with, was just more then they were willing to risk. Melissa, my “good friend” and confidant was nowhere to be found. She quit school and eventually never wanted to speak to me again. Apparently, one of the chemical company guys was working with undercover police all along. He gave a dirty piss test and the military police agreed to minimize his sentence if he framed Melissa’s husband and brought down a few others. It didn’t take long before several of the guys, along with Melissa’s husband, were discharged and/or put in jail.

I wasn’t really interested in being grounded for the rest of my life anyway so I just stayed under the radar for a while. I was secretly thankful that I didn’t get caught up in any of that police action. So I played the good girl part. I went to and from my Dairy Queen job without question. I had no friends so I watched a lot of TV, walked the dog, and talked on the phone with Liz.

At some point, months later, a few of the remaining Army guys contacted me and it was discussed that if we all met up and partied in a hotel room outside of Ft. Carson I wouldn’t technically be on Ft. Carson and therefore not really breaking any rules. So like an idiot I did it. The guys got some beers and met a girlfriend and I up in a hotel room.

Just a few beers were had at the hotel. It wasn’t anything out of a nasty after school special or anything. After a few of those beers someone dared me to call the local radio station and request a song. I think it was I Believe, by Blessid Union of Souls. (You can stop laughing now..) Being the follower that I was of course I called the radio station! Lucky me of course I got through! Of course I said ON THE AIR, “Hi!!! This is Jessica calling from a hotel room where I’m hanging out with all my buddies from Ft. Caron havING a few drinks! Can you play I believe, by Blessid Union of Souls”?! OF COURSE MY DAD was out with my sister at that moment. OF COURSE they were listening to the local pop station while he was letting her drive with her new drivers permit. OF COURSE it was the local pop station THAT I WAS ANNOUCING MYSELF ON! OF COURSE!

Can you say, “BUSTED”?

posted by Jessiedc28 @ 3:17 PM