I GOT A RACCOON TO EAT OUT OF MY HAND!!!

The goth kids started a fire in the fire pit as they quizzed me on where I’d been, what I’ve seen so far. They were cute in that they’d ask me a question, and before I could get out half an answer they’d interrupt me, telling me something about themselves or saying something like, "You’re cool. Are you gonna live here month-to-month?" At one point they asked if I knew a song by Insane Clown Posse and when I said no they took it upon themselves, all of them, to rap it in its entirety. They each did their own little ghetto dance as they rapped, except for Quiet Vanessa, who sat crossed-legged in a lawn chair and stared at the ground, a cigarette in her pale fingers.

I liked them, and they were fun kids, although I didn’t understand the whole "Rah Rah Yay For Death And Negativity Let’s All Go Pretend To Drink Blood And Write Depressing Poetry" attitude. Having hung out with them for a few days now, I have a better understanding, but I still don’t feel very akin to that. I’m a glass-half-full person and it’s the only thing that keeps me going sometimes. I’ve always thought that life is hard enough without dwelling on the negative. Then again, these kids, from what I can tell, have lived much harder lives than I.

That night was great. We jammed, sat by the fire, and they told me all about themselves. They were young - Jojo is 20, David is 19, Vanessa is 15 and Audri is 14. Scrappy, the littlest, is the oldest one at 22. I felt like a den mother as we built the fire up. At one point Scrappy turned to me and said, "I wish you’d let me paint your nails black."
"You have the stuff right now?"
He proudly produced a bottle of Manic Panic black polish from the pocket of his huge black cargos, holding it up as if to say, "Ta-daaa!"
"Well... maybe just one," I said.
"Yeah, let me do your middle finger, so when you go to flip somebody off you’ll be all black and rebel-y!"

He knelt down at my feet and took my left hand, deftly painting it with the finesse of a Korean nail artist. This led to a conversation on make-up, which the boys readily joined in. David remarked, "I actually like to use clear lip gloss mixed with eye shadow as a lipstick because it doesn’t come off when you drink or eat. You don’t really have to reapply, y’know?"
"Yeah!" Scrappy chimed in. "And when you use, like, green or blue, it looks really cool." By this time he was busy painting Audri’s nails.
"Yeah, I like to wear bright blue eye shadow on my eyes but black eyeshadow as lipstick. That looks hot," David said.

I was just sitting back, listening, when David offered, "I’m pretty much a girl." He pointed to his black t-shirt and black pants, saying, "This is actually pretty masculine for me. I usually wear, like, a long black skirt with some fishnets and a black wifebeater."
Scrappy said, "Yeah, David’s pretty much the gayest straight guy you’ll ever meet. The gayest you can get but still be straight."
"Yep, he’s right," David said.

It was charming how open they were. They thrive on being misfits. They thrive on underground acceptance. Us girls got on the topic of what is "fat" at one point. I was so happy when Vanessa, who is not skinny, told me, "A lot of kids say I’m fat but I know I’m really not. And I’m not going to go out of my way to be skinny just because people don’t accept me the way I am. If they don’t, then they’re not cool. I like me the way I am and so do my friends. That’s enough." I wanted to jump over the fire and hug her - if only I had been such a stalwart at 15!

Scrappy and I were talking about eye color and he started a sentence, "Both my babies’ mommas..." I thought he was kidding and started laughing. He wasn’t. "No, really, I have two sons," he told me.
I stopped laughing. "How old are they?" I asked.
"Uh, two. They’re six months apart, " he added sheepishly.
"Wow..." was all I could get out.

Honestly, this kid doesn’t even look old enough to know what sex is. At 22, he could pass for 14. And at 22, he has two kids. By two different girls. Wow.

"I’m trying to be a good dad, y’know?" he says. "But I’m not really allowed to see Hunter. His mom won’t let me see him until I pay off my child support balance."
"How soon will that be?" I ask.
"Well, I’m sort of between jobs right now. I’m trying to get a job at Purina (the dog food factory) and pack food for awhile. Then I should be good."
"What happened to your last job?"
"I got fired for...." He told one of those stories that you hear every now and then that are obviously biased for the teller and against the boss, how it was all the bosses’ fault and in no part due to any mistake they themselves made.
"I see."
"Yeah, it’s tough. But Draven, I’m allowed to see him whenever I want. If I had a license I would go see him every day. He’s my little juggalo!" (By observing the goth kids in their natural habitat, I have deciphered that "juggalo" is a slang term for "white rap-obsessed person".)
"Why don’t you have a license?" I asked.
"It got suspended."
"Why?"
"Child support. I didn’t pay my child support on time."
See, this is what is wrong with America. Assuming Scrappy is telling the truth, this means that the government punishes people by relieving them of their driving abilities because they have no job, thereby rendering them even less likely to be able to find and secure one. It’s ridiculous! I mean, there’s no real public transportation up here in Dunkirk, y’know? It’s not like he could get on the bus or anything. God, why do laws make absolutely no sense?

Audri has a spitting problem. Seriously. While she and I were sitting by the fire it was like her saliva was poisonous, she was spitting it out so fast. I kept laughing at her. Some more kids showed up, two boys about 17, and the boys, except for Scrappy, went in the house. Audri followed them after awhile and then came running back out, all excited. "I just spit!" she cried. "It was so good, it was like the best I ever spit!"
"Uh, that’s gross," I said.
"No, no, not like that. I spit lyrics! Come on, I’ll show ya!"

She grabbed me by the hand and led me into Jojo’s room, where an impromptu freestyle rap session was going on. The DVD player was looping beats and all the kids were standing around in a circle, taking turns "spitting". I grabbed my voice recorder from my room and went back in, sticking it in the face of whoever was up. As I did so, I looked around at all their faces, marveling at their creativity. These are kids who may not be Rhodes scholars, they may never drive a Lexus or even own a house, but at least they are passionate about something. Even if it’s not something I necessarily understand or like, at least it’s something.

Audri and Vanessa have curfews so David left to bring them home, as did the two random kids who showed up, so that left Scrappy and Jojo and I to carry on the fire-fest. While we were sitting out there, a big raccoon padded out of the woods and up to the garbage can. I fell in love with it.

I went in the room to grab a piece of bread and started throwing tiny pieces to it. After awhile it got used to me, and after grabbing more and more bread, about 30 minutes later, it got comfortable enough with me to eat out of my hand! It was the coolest thing ever!!! It only did it two times before Scrappy came up behind me to try to feed it and it got scared, but before that it ate out of my hands twice! The first time it grabbed the bread out of my hand with it’s paws and then sat on its hind legs, looking at me while it chewed. The second time it lowered its head to my fingers, looking me in the eye the whole time, and grabbed the bread in its teeth, then sat back up on its haunches again to chew. That’s when Scrappy scared it, but like I said, even so it was the coolest little guy ever!

So I’ve just been here, chilling, partying, making friends and writing, splitting my time between Dunkirk and Cassadaga. I go to Grandma’s Kitchen every day for breakfast or lunch, do some writing, get funny looks from the locals who’ve never seen a girl using a laptop in a diner, drive around, look at stuff, come back to the motel, make a fire, drink some beers and play around with the goth kids. We wrestle, we do gymnastics, we watch movies, I play guitar and we have singalongs. God bless them, they have their little dramas and spats that teenagers love to have, but overall they’re great kids.