The Pinball Machine

A teenage boy struggles to make meaning of the high school experience in this epic filled with impulsive drives to Canada, numerous cups of coffee, and a pinball machine.

The rulebook was born on the first day of my sophomore year of high school when our principal opened his beginning of the year speech with the words, “These are the best years of your life.” I was so mad I threw my biology textbook at him. I was aiming for his head, but I hit him in the knee. I guess I threw pretty hard because he wore a cast for the rest of semester. Anyways, I got dragged down to the office and given an out-of-school suspension for “assaulting a teacher.” But I wasn’t even upset. I was awash in the romantic fervor of having been punished for an act that I felt was just. I mean, high school had better not be the best years of our lives. From that moment on I resolved to throw something anytime someone said something about how great high school was. That's the first rule.

 

The second rule was created in Mr. Stanley’s classroom. Mr. Stanley is the U.S. History teacher here at Clearview high, and he is without a doubt the only qualified faculty member employed at this school. I knew I was going to like him right away because he offered our class free coffee. “See that coffee maker?” he said, pointing to  his desk. “Every day I brew two pots. One in the morning, one right after lunch. You kids can help yourselves so long as I’ve already had a cup.” Several of the students, me included, stood up to get some.

“Don't you have any cream or sugar?” protested a group of girls in the back, “Then we could make lattes.”

“What do I look like, a Starbucks?” Mr. Stanley roared. “I drink folgers dark brew and I drink it black. If you don’t like it, then you can get your coffee elsewhere.” That shut everyone up. Everyone but me.

“Mr. Stanley, this coffee tastes just like crude oil.”

Mr. Stanley grinned. “But it makes you feel alive doesn’t it? That’s the whole point.”

It did make me feel alive, I realized. And so I resolved to always drink as much coffee as I could get my hands on. Because of this I average three cups a day and I always seem to have shaky hands and chapped lips. But it’s never not worth it.

 

Rule number three: Steal other people’s random stuff. This mostly ties into rule number six, but sometimes I do it just for kicks. More on rule number six later.

 

The fourth rule gets me into more trouble than any other rule. It states that whenever things get boring, I have to do something to make them interesting again. I know this sounds like quite the commitment on my part, but really, it's something I do anyways. One example of this is the time my English teacher spent 45 minutes of class talking about the new wheat-free diet her doctor had recommended. I responded by writing my Huckleberry Finn essay on the new all-ramen diet I had adopted (Beef packet for breakfast, chicken packet for lunch, pork packet for afternoon tea, and come dinnertime I mix all three flavors together - and I’ve never had more energy in my entire life!). Needless to say she failed me; but who cares? If Mark Twain was my teacher I would have gotten an A+. Another example of this rule is the time that Mr. Stanley lectured on the lunar landing. I swear. We learn the exact same stuff every year. I’ve been learning about the lunar landing every year since kindergarden. I only barely managed to cut through the mundane lecture by faking a nervous breakdown. “Lies!” I screamed, “It’s all lies! Propaganda! The lunar landing was faked and President Kennedy was an alien! The NSA is watching us, and the only way to protect ourselves is to wear little tinfoil hats. We should all move to Canada. This kind of s**t doesn’t happen there!” Mr. Stanley responded by throwing a whiteboard eraser at my head, which is exactly what makes him so cool. Any other teacher would have gotten butthurt, and tried to prove why I was wrong. Mr. Stanley knew that I knew I was wrong.

 

If you're wondering why I need a rulebook to tell me to throw things and drink coffee, it would be because you are a normal person. Being a normal person, you probably see the world as a big round place, full of people and mountains and cities and roads and cars and stuff like that. Not me. When I see the world I see a pinball machine: a collection of swirling lights and spinning wheels. I hear loud clanging sound effects that boom from minuscule speakers and I watch circular bumpers that smack shining silver balls in random directions. I see a maze of twisting paths that always change, never lead the same way twice, and all too often deposit you in the gutter: the inevitable destination at the end of the game. For me, the rulebook is a strategy. It's a way to make meaning from the chaos. It’s a  method that, if followed, will lead me to high score before I hit the gutter.

 

All this brings me to my point, which is the fifth rule: Always be building the pinball machine. Pretty early on in my high school career I realized that If I didn’t find some way to express myself I would lose my mind. I would paint, if I was capable of creating art, but I’m not. I would write songs, if I could write songs, but I can’t. The only thing I am really good at is pinball. And so, I decided to build a pinball machine. A pinball machine so great it would capture the entire sucky-ness of the American high school experience. I constructed the frame in my woodworking class last year, much to the chagrin of my shop teacher (“Can’t you just build a bookshelf like every other kid?”). Now it sits in my bedroom at home, where I slowly add objects that seem to encapsulate the agony of high school. So far I have a packet of ramen noodles, a used condom, pawns from a chessboard, the quarterback’s letter jacket (stolen from his locker during P.E.), a cracked cell phone, a  hardcover copy of Lord of the Flies, a blueprint of the high school, a pad of tardy slips (stolen from the receptionist while she was pretending she couldn’t hear my excuse for being late), six pregnancy tests (used and unused), and finally, the cast from my principal’s leg (also stolen-don’t ask how). I nail them to the plywood case where they sit, frozen in time, waiting to be pummeled by a tiny silver ball.

It's almost finished. Almost. It’s still missing some things. But by the time I graduate from this prison, I will have finished it. Immediately following the graduation ceremony I will leave the pinball machine in the middle of the school cafeteria. I won’t be around to see how it is received. By that time, I will be halfway to Canada.

 

Third period is Biology and I have never been on time once. That's the sixth rule: Always show up late to third period. My teacher is so used to me being late that she marks me tardy before I even show up. Never absent. Just tardy. The Lady at the front office prepares my tardy slip ahead of time. She leaves it on her desk for me to pick up. She used to ask me why I was late. I gave a different answer each time.

“The hottest girl I have ever met just mugged me.” “My house caught on fire.” “I just wanted to say hi, see how you were doing.” “I fell out of the school bus this morning. I just now got here.”

“Yodeling convention.” My parents made me go.”

She doesn’t ask anymore. She leaves my tardy slips on the counter, hoping I will take them in silence, but I give her excuses anyway. The real reason I am late is because I am in Mr. Stanley’s room, pouring myself a second cup of coffee and waiting for the tardy bell to ring.

 

Rule number seven states that I only have to tell the truth about things that everyone else lies about. I fulfill its duties with statements such as, “yeah I pick my nose, you can see a booger stain on my pants right here”, or “There are two kinds of people in the world: people who pee in the shower, and liars.” or, “I watch porn at least once a week. Usually more.” My peers usually respond to these statements by saying that I’m just trying to get attention, and that if you ignore me I will stop. But the reality is much more terrifying. The reality is that when I’m all alone, even when I’m locked in my room with nobody to hear me except the walls, I still say that I watch internet porn multiple times a week. The walls in my room never respond. I don’t think they care.

The thing about the truth is that it usually isn’t what you want to hear.

The other day I was in Mr. Stanley’s room, sipping my fifth cup of coffee for the day, when I asked, “Is high school going to be the best part of my life?” I was preparing to throw something if he gave the wrong answer.

“The hell if I know,” he said, as he loaded a PowerPoint on the projector. “Wasn’t for me. It probably was for some people. But I think it’s dangerous to say that anything is the best part of life. Life is different for everybody.”

Mr Stanley was absolutely right, and I had to admit it even if I didn’t want to. What he said made me realize that life really is like a pinball machine. Not because you have to fight to understand how it works and to get a highscore, but because every pinball machine is different and the only rule that really matters is this: It doesn't matter how you keep your ball from going down the gutter, so long as it works.

 

The hardest rule to follow is rule number 7: I can't let myself drive to Canada until I graduate. I graduate in two years. I’ve got two more years of this. Some days, the vast amount of days before I’m actually allowed to go to Canada kicks in and I find myself heading north on the interstate instead of going to school in the morning. I always manage to pull myself back into reality and drive to school instead. One time I was determined to not go to school. I had been driving towards Canada for about an hour and a half. I had a full tank of gas, and a backpack full of ramen noodles. I was almost to the border when I realized that my third period teacher was going to mark me late, trusting that I would show up. What would it do to her when I didn’t show up? I mean, people need constants in life. Ms. Gleason seemed like a relatively stable person, but you never know…

 

I turned around at the next exit and drove all the way back to the school. By the time I arrived there were only five minutes left in third period. But I wasn’t absent. Not yet. I raced into Mr. Stanley’s classroom. “I’m very sorry to interrupt your class, Mr. Stanley”, I shouted, “But damn it, I really need a cup of coffee.” Mr. Stanley rolled his eyes and continued to lecture. I poured myself a steaming mug of tar and raced out of the room.

Next stop was the front office. My tardy slip was still waiting for me on the receptionists desk. “I was abducted by a race of aliens that draws their energy from incredibly attractive people. I barely managed to escape.” I explained even though she didn’t ask. I ran out of the front office and up the stairs towards my biology classroom.

 

Only 3 minutes left. That was enough time for me to put in earphones and blast my very favorite song which is “Pinball Wizard,” by The Who. I took a long gulp of burning hot coffee. It was bitter. I could feel it burning down my throat. By the time I reached biology, I was feeling pretty darned great about myself, which is probably why I tripped as soon as I opened the door. I face planted into the linoleum floor, and sent my coffee mug flying across the room. It shattered against Ms. Gleason’s desk creating an explosion of steaming brown liquid and shards of ceramic. I was on the floor tangled in my earbuds. “I’m here Ms. Gleason. I’m here and I didn’t ditch your dumb class!” I shouted. She walked over to me, and took the tardy slip from my outstretched hand.  “You may go to your seat,” she tried to say, but she was interrupted by the sound of the bell. Class was out. The students rose from their seats and filed towards the door. I was on my hands and knees gathering the broken pieces of my mug. It would make an excellent addition to the pinball machine. As they passed, some of the students laughed at me. Some looked away. Some sneered. One stopped to remark that if I really didn’t care I should consider just not showing up. But this time, I wasn’t bothered. They needed me, I realized. As much as they hated to admit it, they needed me. They needed someone to act on the impulses that they themselves ignored. They needed someone to refuse to care so that they could continue caring. And because I was still here, and because there was nothing better to do, I was more than happy to oblige.

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