Things I Used to Wear: S.T.A.R.S.

Look you guys, I need to get something off my chest: I used to volunteer as a abstinence-only "teen mentor" for middle-schoolers.

Seriously: in the Students Today Aren't Ready for Sex program, or S.T.A.R.S. for short. This is the shirt I wore every week to brainwash the young and impressionable minds of 12- and 13-year-old boys and girls.

I'm so embarrassed. I was going to confess this yesterday in my Blog for Choice post because it seemed relevant. But then, on the other hand, it didn't seem relevant.

In my defense, I was young and foolish. I needed to pad my college applications with something more versatile and substantial than athletics. S.T.A.R.S. was perfect in this capacity. To the casual viewer, this activity demonstrated that I was compassionate and interested in current affairs; a leader among men. However, to anyone else I probably seemed like a spineless d-bag, easily persuaded into selling her soul by empty rhetoric and the possibility of interacting with conservative Christian boys.

You know, the funny thing is that sometimes being a spineless d-bag has it's advantages. In the 3rd week of my second year doing S.T.A.R.S. (no, I didn't get enough the first time around), both of my co-mentors were going to be out of town for some super-fab spring break trip I wasn't invited to. There were a number of fellow mentors who could fill in for the one session, but I decided to impose on a guy I'd been interested in for the past few months. Why not? The fact was I needed someone to help me run the session, and this was innocent enough. Plus, he had a car.

So, what happened? Did we hook up wearing our S.T.A.R.S. shirts? Um, no. This is not that story. The boy in question, let's call him Val Kilmer, agreed to assist me for the one session. We were alone in his car. We got lunch. We talked about music and mutual friends. It was one of those very strange situations that when you're in them, you have no idea what's going on. Afterwards, you think that maybe it could have been almost a date, but it was definitely not a date because either you or the other person was being weird. And you only realize that it could have been sort of a date a few days later, and by then it is much, much to late to do anything about the fact that you blew it. (Those last couple sentences sound like they could have been part of a monologue in the movie "He's Just Not That Into You." Which, bt-dubs, is the worst movie in existence. Or at least top 10.)

Obviously, I was the one who blew it, for reasons that would be foreign to me except for I don't think they even exist. Being a teenager and trying to get a little action is hard enough, and it is nearly impossible when the irony of your self-righteous, abstinent douchebaggery is staring you in the face. Ay, ay, ay. (Looking back, the writing was on the wall. A popular strip club in my hometown shared the name of the program, so I was often teased about working for Stars Cabaret when I wore this t-shirt to school. In my dreams, people.)

When I found the picture of this shirt tonight, that was the first memory that popped into my head. Ridiculous, huh? For the record, the second memory was of a fellow teen mentor roleplaying the part of a 12-year-old during training. For some reason she was also playing the part as if she were a Chinese-Italian exchange student. "Wat iz dees prega-nancy?" she wondered obnoxiously.

I think this video pretty much sums up the situation.

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Things I Used to Wear is an irregular series featuring strange items from my former wardrobe. Past entries have included a tank top, shoes, a shirt, glittery makeup and another tank top.