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Schmuck is a fun word. As my dad explained it to me when I
was a little kid, it's a vulgar Yiddish expression. Supposedly it's roughly
equivalent to "dick;' "cock;' or other vulgar English expressions whose
meanings roughly correlate to "penis." I've never cared enough to deter-
mine whether or not this is true.

§

At some point the little penis in my pants grew a nickname for
me. It was a lousy fucking nickname, and getting rid of it was a night-
mare.

The locker room, West Ridge High School, my senior year.
Guys changing, peeling off saggingjeans and pulling on loose mesh
shorts, exchanging one plain white shirt for another, securing wallets
and expensive cell phones in their lockers, sharing rude jokes and talking
about the girls changing in the locker room on the other side of the
gymnasium.

Julia's the hottest, no, Marie is, no, Becky totally is. You guys are
dead wrong-Sophia is the hottest for sure. She's got huge tits. Yeah, but
she has no ass, and besides her face looks like my grandma. Marie always
smells like cigarettes. Yeah, so do you. I know, but it's manly when I smell
like Marlboro Reds-it's just nasty when a girl smells like them. My dad

smokes Marlboro Reds, that's not fucking manly. Speaking of which, what

does Marie smoke? Uh, I think she smokes Parliaments. No, no, no, Mary
smokes Parliaments, Marie smokes American Spirits. Whoa whoa, you

mean Fat Mary? Yeah, Fat Mary. She smokes two packs ofParliaments a

day. Marie is such afucking hipster, she ought to hook up with Mitch. Yeah
Mitch, you're the biggest focking hipster there is-you have a neckbeard,
you wear fockingflanne4 and you listen to all that weird music, on vinyl
no less. Yeah, it's on viny4 because the sound is better-also, it's not weird
music, you just can't understand it. Learn a thing or two about irony,for
goodness'sake. Also, it's not a neckbeard-it's a ".friendly goatee." What
the luck is that s'posed to mean? Aw, it'sjust a more hipster way ojsaying
"neckbeard:" Hey, isn't that McCallister? Hey McCallister, your shorts are
gapping-oh god, your dick is so small!

Ob god, your dick is so small.

"Yeah man;' started Troy Davis, (muscular figure, resonant
football-player groan,) "it's like a fuckin' baby's dick,"

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