One major difference now was that I was exercising and had already put on about five pounds of muscle. Before, I had looked anorexic, now I just looked slender. Even after I stopped growing, I was so skinny I had needed all my suits tailored for me. Maybe this time I could buy off-the-rack and have them fit.
It started within a few weeks of school starting. Two weeks into the fall semester I was walking through the kitchen when Mom stopped me. We had a measuring spot on the door frame between the kitchen and dining room, with lines drawn in different colors for each of us kids. "Come here, get against the door frame.", she said. I grinned and got into position. We normally did this on our birthdays, so this was a couple of months early for me. She put the ruler on top of my head and I scooted out from underneath it. "Well, I know what you're getting for your birthday - new clothes!" Mom, if you only knew! As it was, she had to buy me a couple of pairs of blue jeans anyway, because they were too short.
Ninth grade was similar to eighth grade, but was more focused for the college prep kids. We no longer took general science, but now took Biology. Everyone else would get that in high school. Likewise, the college prep kids took a second year of algebra and a foreign language. My deal with Mrs. Bakkley had her tutoring me in Plane Geometry, and required me to make a weekly visit to Towson High to see Mrs. Rogers and turn in assignments and receive new ones. Mom or Dad would usually take me over after school.
Spanish II was livened up this year. We had a new girl in school, a transfer, Rebecca Rinaldi. Becky was a State Department brat, and had lived in a bunch of different Latin American countries, moving every few years when her father was transferred to a different embassy. She was perfectly fluent in Spanish, and delighted in teaching the class all the words you didn't find in El Camino Real. Cussing in Spanish became the new sport! We also knew enough Spanish now to get into trouble. If you didn't know what the word was, you could always fake it by adding an 'o' to the end of the English word. You'd usually get a laugh and be told what the word was. This time it backfired on Tammy Roberts, who had to say she was embarrassed, so she said 'Yo soy embarrassado.' The teacher broke down in laughter before explaining it to us. 'Embarrassado' means pregnant! Tammy was the butt of jokes for a month after that.
I was now in the 9th grade chorus. Back on my first go-around, I had played trumpet all through elementary and junior high schools. I have no known musical talent. When I got recycled (for want of a better word) I hadn't held a trumpet in my hands for over fifty years! I didn't even know how to blow into it anymore, let alone how to key the notes. One of the biggest blowups we had last year was when I announced I wanted to stop playing the trumpet and sing in the chorus. Chorus was for those kids who couldn't afford an instrument or were too stupid to play one. My utter lack of ability was not considered grounds for change. Thank God my voice had changed by then, because I finally settled the argument by breaking into 'The Impossible Dream' from Man of La Mancha. While the movie wouldn't come out for several years, my parents had a copy of the sound track from the Broadway play. It is a tremendous song for a baritone, and they were simply stunned. To look at me you wouldn't think I could pull it off, but I had once sung baritone in the church choir.
By the time my birthday rolled around, I was already well on the way to my final height. I had grown another couple of inches since Mom had measured me, and I was on the way to outgrowing the clothes she had bought me at the start of the year. She fretted over this, and I just laughed and told her I was going to be taller than her by my next birthday. She just rolled her eyes and muttered a lot. I told her to save everything that I grew out of, since Hamilton was probably going to do the same thing in another two or three years. He ended up three inches taller than me!
School became vastly more interesting in mid-November. The Science Fair was announced. Students could enter a project in the annual Science Fair, to be judged in the spring; it was expected of all the college prep crew to participate (read required) and optional for other students. It was open for individual students, or as teams of two.
Back when I did this the first time, I did it by myself, and took second place, with a project showing the effects of different radiation levels on the growth of barley plants from irradiated seeds. The first place winner was Mike Misner, who was a buddy in the college prep group. His project involved growing a bunch of fertilized chicken eggs in an incubator. Every day he would harvest an egg and place it in a jar in formaldehyde, showing fetal growth. The leftover eggs at the end of the project he hatched, so we had peeping chickens at the fair. Timing was everything. I had the better science, but let's face it, peeping chickens make for great theater. Mike continued this field of endeavor, ending up as a pediatrician down in Annapolis.
I decided on better theater myself, but growing chickens in the house was out of the question. I had already decided to do a project on the tar in cigarettes. Randy Bronson did this the last time, using a vacuum pump to 'smoke' cigarettes and collecting the tar they generated. That was all he did, though, collect the tar. Adequate theater but lousy science. I figured I could dress it up and do better science and I might beat the chickens. I put in a proposal the first day of the announcement, before Randy had a chance.
The interesting part was when Shelley Talbot came up to me that week in the hallway. I was very curious about this, because up until now, Shelley had looked at me like something to be scraped off the bottom of her shoe. She was one of the popular girls, very pretty, and the rumor mill had it down as gospel that chastity was not one of her cardinal virtues. Supposedly she put out, but I had serious doubts about a fourteen or fifteen year old girl doing that back in the Sixties. Then again, I did have a feeling she was more advanced than her classmates. She was the only girl in the school who I knew for a fact dyed her hair. In the eighth grade she had been a blonde. This year she was a brunette.
She came up to me between classes at my locker. "Carl, can I talk to you for a bit?"
I smiled and said, "What's up?" For the first time in my life I was actually tall enough to look a girl in the eye!
"Well, you know, we have to do a project for the science fair. What are you doing?"
I gave a brief explanation of my plan. "What were you doing?", I asked. I was curious. Technically the Science Fair was optional, but participation would be good for your grade. In practical terms, it was required for college prep, and Shelley was not college prep.
She groaned, "I can't think of anything!"
"You need some ideas? I suppose I can help with that."
"Uh..." She gave me a slightly coquettish look. "Well, I was wondering. You know, we can do this in teams of two, and I was wondering, uh, maybe..."
I stared at her. This was totally out of the blue! This was a girl who wouldn't give me the time of day before. What was going on?! "You want to team with me? Why?"
"Oh, God, Carl! Like, you're so smart! Everybody knows you take classes over at Towson and all. You're straight A, for Christ's sake! You're going to blow this away!"
I gave her a thoughtful look. "Yeah? So, what's in it for me?"
"What do you mean?" The idea that somebody wouldn't be dying to have her in their team was an alien concept.