You said "we're playing house." Now you still say we are.

I don't think about middle school very often. In moments of childhood nostalgia my mind wanders to elementary school, and for any other scholastic-reminiscence (good classes, fun memories, cool field trips) high school trumps junior high in nearly every conceivable way. For various social reasons I also have legitimate cause for actively avoiding thinking about middle school, just in case the hyena sound of seventh grade boy laughter has the ability to defy time and space.

When I do think about middle school, though (or even more broadly, about myself between the ages of 12 and 14), what comes to mind are mostly brief, flashing, dissociated moments from various classes. Like Jake's interminable, eleven page, 22 minute oral summary of Watership Down. Or how kids avoided the front row in Mr. Ambrose's classes due to his habit of spit-talking. Or the iguana in my science class who would frequently fall from the top of his cage to the floor with a loud thud at unpredictable times during class. But for the life of me I can't remember what I did in my free time, what I cared about, talked about, or thought about. If asked to describe my middle school personality, the best I could offer would be "probably kind of quiet and nerdy." The whole montage of memories is even muted.

This is in contrast to practically every other time in my life that I'm capable of remembering, including elementary school and even before. I remember thinking that the dress-up corner in pre-school was stupid because none of the outfits were interesting. I remember wanting to help my friends in kindergarten through their alphabet worksheets so that we could go play with the blocks faster. I remember desperately wanting to stand at the front of "the line," for no apparent reason. I remember making clay pinch-pots in art class and coveting my friend Kathleen's pot because hers was prettier than mine, so I convinced her that we should trade pots as a gesture of our friendship.

There are all sorts of dubiously Freudian reasons I can think of for why my memories of middle school might be sketcher than those of other points in my life. Whatever the reason, though, I find it slightly disturbing that it's not the events or people that I tend to forget, but my characteristically chatty internal monologue. How am I supposed to remember what I was like if I can't remember how I silently judged everyone around me?