Middle School
For the most part, “Month in Mishawaka” was compiled to correspond with the chronological order in which the individual poems were written. The largest exception to this was the placement of “Middle School”. As I expressed in my introduction, poems placed in Chapter I: Overture serve to provide background– an explanation as to why Depression manifested in the first place. Middle school is the birthplace of a disproportionate amount of angst– the origin of infinite hormonal discomfort. It may be the most perfect exhibition of the misguided values we have cultivated as a society.
Everything we believed to be important as middle schoolers seems utterly ridiculous now– or is it? Being preoccupied with who I would be taking to the sixth grade dance was only the first of many social concerns. We spend more time in our lives assessing our social standing than anything else. Who are my friends? My enemies? Who do I take to the dance? When do I need to settle down and get married? Am I “in”? Or “out”? I feel that at least a symbolic genesis of these fears is middle school and that opening the book with this poem would strike a proverbial chord with most, as most can recount the unprecedented awkwardness and discomfort that we all believe left our lives after eighth grade.
I still felt shame for many years after I attended that oh-so-pointless eighth grade graduation and walked across the stage to collect that oh-so-flammable eighth grade diploma. I constantly asked myself why I was never accepted by my peers, as that was something that did not change much after I left. That self consciousness, endured for years without recess, wears the pointed soul down to a palatable, agreeable, and dull form.
The true objective of writing and publishing “Month in Mishawaka” was to regain that sharpness. It was to cast off my own self doubt and to embrace all of myself as I struggled to escape Depression’s constricting grasp, hence the decision to place “Middle School” first. That is where I started; now observe my freedom, and know that I am proud to be me.
