(The name used in this blog has been changed due to my fear that this man has become the sociopath I assume he is today, along with my desire to not end up murdered and/or what not.)
I was never the athletic type; I know, that is hard to believe. I could not throw a ball very far, or even catch well, for that matter; but there was one sport I was good at, and that was soccer. Now I was not great, but I was good. And if you don’t believe me, go look in my room at my numerous trophies that I earned over my years, that I later found out had to be purchased by my mother. (Please don’t really look in my room. It is now my mom’s office. But if you had looked there before I moved out, you would have seen the trophies, I swear.) I played soccer throughout elementary school, and even was on my seventh grade team! I hope I am not bragging too much here. Anyways, In 9th grade, during gym class, we were outside on the football field playing a good old fashioned game of soccer. Throughout our half-hour of playing, I used what little coordination and dexterity that I had, and I helped my team win. And being the good sport that I am, I yelled something along the lines of, “Yes! We won. You guys suck.” I was very mature for my age. After my remark, I got an interesting response from a student on the opposing team. He said, “I’m going to burn your house down.” I was confused. “What did you just say?” I asked. “I am going to burn your house down,” he responded. “Ummm…OK, whatever,” I wittily replied. I ignored him, just assuming he was doing what weird people do best, and that was acting weird.
This guy’s name was Frank. Yah, let’s call him Frank. I grew up with him, knowing him at least since Kindergarten; we may have even gone to preschool together. He was an interesting person. I remember in 6th grade, him walking around with his left arm straight in the air, as any good Nazi would do. He would explain himself saying that Nazis used their right arm, not their left, therefore, he was not a Nazi. It was then that I knew this twelve-year-old had a bright future ahead of him. In later years, he would keep a copy of “The Communist Manifesto” in his briefcase, explaining how great Communism was, and how it was just misused. While that last sentence may have had some amount of validity to it, I knew better than to take to heart anything coming from a high school student that carried a briefcase instead of a backpack. There were many instances where this guy’s behavior bothered me. I remember we had an icebreaker activity during our freshman year. There was a couple hundred of us on the basketball court, and we were participating in one of those lame activities where you cross the line if you have done or believe something. “Cross the line if you have any regrets.” “Cross the line if you have ever said you hate someone.” “Cross the line if you are completely free from prejudice.” During this last one, he was one of only three people that crossed. One of them was the basketball coach, but he used to be on the San Diego Clippers, so that means he’s super awesome, and deserves a pass. The other was a student who eventually hacked into our school’s website and put a picture of a naked transsexual on the main page. No comment there. And lastly, my dear friend, Frank. When I become president, I will be sure that anyone who claims to be free of prejudice is automatically be added to the terrorist watch list.
Two days after the soccer game, I came home from school, not experiencing anything out of the ordinary. I walked in my house, and my mom had a semi-concerned look on her face. “Do you know what this is about?” I looked at the piece of paper she was holding. There was a white piece of paper, with a match glued to it, below a message saying “Your insolence will not be tolerated.” I knew I should’ve been worried, as someone is threatening me, or someone in my family. I was not sure what they were threatening me with though. I instantly thought of a line from a recent Star Trek movie where someone yelled “I will not tolerate your insolence.” This guy was too lazy to even come up with his own threat! Now I’m no genius, but I know when someone is threatening me with inverted quotes from mediocre sequels to movies based on classic TV shows. Lame, very lame. I will admit that gluing the match to the paper was pretty creative. Putting together that letter and my threat from earlier in the week was like doing a puzzle created by an abecedarian sociopath. Not bad, for his first time. We’ve all got to start somewhere. I myself would’ve gone with an obscure quote from Kiefer Sutherland in Stand By Me, “This is big time, baby,” and glued an album from the band Firehouse onto the paper. That would’ve taken a little more thought, but to each his own.
After I figured out what this was about, I told my mom what happened. She called the school, a police officer came to my house, and I had a meeting with the Vice Principal the next day. Two meetings with powerful people within 24 hours - I was preparing myself for Hollywood. As I walked into the locker room the next day, I saw Frank. All I said was, “That was you, wasn’t it?” He replied with, “You can’t prove anything.” Now, I didn’t say “Hey, was that you that put a match in my mailbox? Because I think it might be, since you’re the only person who has threatened to burn my house down in the last few days. I think I can prove it too.” I figured I had this guy busted for good. I then went and met with the Vice Principal. He handled the matter as any quality American public school official would…”I spoke to Frank, he says he didn’t threaten you. Just stay away from him and let me know if he threatens you again.” This is where I wanted to get up and smack him. “He threatened to burn my house down!! There’s a match in my mailbox with a threatening letter! Are you that stupid?” I almost wish he burned my house down. This story would have been so much better. And then when the media interviewed the Vice Principal and asked him, “Did you notice signs that made you think that Frank might burn Taylor’s house down?” Then he’d say, “No, I really can’t think of anything….oh wait, there was this one time where he threatened to burn Taylor’s house down, and put a match in his mailbox. That’s about it.” The police officer was not helpful either, just telling me to stay away from him. So there were two meetings with powerful people who ended up not helping me at all…I really was preparing myself for Hollywood.
I rarely had any more encounters with Frank, we stayed away from each other for the rest of the semester, and being in a school with 3200 students, it was easy not to run into him. Within the next couple of years, Frank’s parents would come into my work, a mail/shipping store, and send packages to their son. If in order for you to get a package to your sixteen-year-old son, you are required to use the United States Postal Service, that means something is up. He ended up at some boarding school, that’s all I knew. His parents were very nice to me, and for some reason, I never gave into my urge to say, “Thank you, have a nice day! By the way, your son threatened to burn my house down one time. Oh, and did you want to purchase a book of stamps?”
