The Pants Strategy
I worked on it in 6th grade but 7th grade really brought me around to fine tuning a fundamental style choice, one that had its roots in the late ’50′s and still had traction for many of the boys in 1963. Ours was a variation on the greaser look and, while lacking the leather prominent in its prior incarnation, still retained the D.A. haircut (D.A. was short for Duck’s Ass because of the fan tail that was combed into the rear of our hair), the tight pants, white socks and pointed black leather shoes. Shirt was open to interpretation.
There was a style clash going on in teen world at the time (isn’t there always?) and this one was fueled by the local radio stations that defined their listeners with callers being asked, “Are you a greaser or a frat?”. I think I was a hybrid with the heart of a frat and the fashion of a greaser.
I liked Brylcreem, that soft, white pomade that looked like toothpaste and turned your hair into a shiny oil slick that I’m sure repelled water although I don’t have an exact recollection of that happening. Brylcreem’s signature jingle used the hook “A Little Dab’ll Do Ya!” but we ignored the ‘little’ part and slathered it on there like we were basting a turkey. Comb a big rollover on the top that dropped into a spit curl down the forehead, go strait back on the sides and you had the hair equivalent of cool, at least we thought so.
The shoes had to be pointy to go with the hair and the pointier they were the more striking the look and to compliment the ‘points’, as we referred to them, you had to have very tight khaki pants with short legs and a fabric that was cotton but woven in a way that let it stretch. So when you jumped into a pair of these things they clung to you like Spandex.
In 7th grade I was 12 years old and there was a growing problem with the tight pants.
That growing problem seemed rather like it had a mind of its own and reacted to forces beyond my knowledge or expertise and before I even had time to call it by its proper name, the spontaneous erection was wreaking havoc with my fashion statement.
If I wanted to keep the pants I was going to have to figure out how not to reveal my growing problem which my pants so generously displayed at the slightest provocation. What the hell, sometimes with no provocation! I’d be sitting at my desk, minding my own business and out of nowhere the south rises again and it’s almost time to leave and go to my next class but I can’t get up without blowing the cover of the desktop.
So I’d sit there until everyone left class and then pray that the teacher and my erection would both leave at the same time. It was torture and an accident waiting to happen because those damn pants left no room for error and my only strategy was to remove even a hint of cerebral acknowledgment of the female figure which was nearly impossible in a school full of girls.
Also, for some reason, I had the ridiculous idea that I was the only one going through this. I knew the other guys were at the same juncture in terms of development but I mistakenly thought that my erection was a renegade; a free-lancer that could do anything it felt like doing without my consent or approval.
Any second over the classroom intercom might come: “Attention all girls of the 7th grade, this is the principal and there is a young boy with a loose cannon in the school. For your own safety please evacuate the building until we can locate the source of the offending member!”
My ‘johnson’ was carrying on like there was a party in my pants and the rest of me had to tag along, stand in the corner like a wallflower and hope to go home early. But don’t get me wrong here, this new hormone explosion was a delight in the right hands but in the school classroom or shopping mall it was a little terrorist waiting to surprise the hell out of me.
But I’d always wait the episode out by talking myself down and then slink out of class and down the hall to my next humiliation. One thing I refused to do was give up the tight pants that were not only a billboard for my crotch but a primary cause of the errant excitement. I was not going to sacrifice style for safety and part of me respects that in hindsight, but the other part, the part with better judgment, wonders what kind of adolescent is dumb enough to walk around in anti-puberty pants.
Fortunately, my pants outlasted my lack of control, but not without plenty of memorable moments. By the way, I should probably apologize for the scads of puns and euphemisms used in the above story but since I never apologized to the 7th grade for the tight pants, why start now?