Safety Boy and the Cancer Club

Some of my fondest memories of college were from my freshman engineering class. It was one of the most difficult classes I have ever attended, and my professor was a real hard-liner, but he still managed to keep it enjoyable.

The mainstay of the class was group work. Our department was not only trying to teach us how to be engineers, but how the engineering environment works in the real world. From day one, we were told that the heart and soul of a project is the design team working on it. The team, and therefore the design, was only as strong as the weakest link.

For a design team to work effectively every member of the team must trust each other implicitly to complete their tasks on time, and to complete them well. Deadlines were non-negotiable, and the team members have the option to essentially vote another member out if they feel that one person isn’t pulling their weight.

As design team leader, it was my duty to find my team member’s strengths and weaknesses and delegate duties accordingly. The five of us tried different roles within the group, but after one project together, it became rather evident.

Abrams was one of the most socially inept people I have ever met. Don’t get me wrong, he was a nice guy, and smart as a whip, but he was definitely the square peg in the round hole. I have never met anyone with the number of eccentricities that he had. He used to listen to Marine marching songs to go to sleep. He was, quite literally the most sheltered, fearful person I have ever met, refusing to do anything that could be deemed remotely bad for him. He had no idea how to decompress, no tobacco, no alcohol, nothing remotely close to anything fun.

He also had a way of saying the most odd things in the world to us.

“You know Jake, you should always eat your French fries before your burger. They have more surface area and cool the fastest!”

Joe had to be without a doubt the most intelligent skater I have ever met. We were going to become roommates until he decided to transfer to ASU. He was the type of guy that could be laid back and intellectual, fitting in pretty much wherever he went. He knew when to party and knew when to get his work done.

Olaf was in his late twenties. He was a Russian born immigrant, moving to the US with his wife to get his degree in structural engineering. He spoke English with a Russian accent, as a second language, but he still seemed to know it better than a lot of people I have talked to. He would always bring the six-packs of Budweiser to the study sessions.

Steve was the dumbest engineering student I have ever met, ultimately, our weakest link. He was the type of guy that looked nearly catatonic when you asked him a question that didn’t involve chicks or beer. He showed up to more than one of our design meetings wreaking of pot, with his bloodshot eyes glazed over and barely open, making an appearance because he knew that if he didn’t, I would force a vote to kick him off the team.

During our first project, our professor handed us the task of coming up with a name for our design group. I pulled together an impromptu meeting.

“Alright guys, we need a name.”

“How about Semper Fidelis?” Abrams piped in.

“Dude, you aren’t even a Marine!”

“I got it dude, Bushwackers!” Apparently Steve wasn’t aware that I was actually looking for good ideas.

“In a word, no.”

A light flickered over my head.

“Well considering all of us party, smoke and drink except for Abrams here, who refuses to leave his dorm without an umbrella if there is even a slight chance of rain, I’ve got a name that would fit us perfectly.”

Abrams looked at me with eyes that I have seen before. It was the I-know-I’m-not-going-to-like-what-you-have-to-say-but-I-want-to-hear-it-anyway look. He was wincing as if he was watching a train wreck.

“Ok, Jake, what is it?”

“Safety Boy and the Cancer Club!”

I got the reaction that I was looking for, laughter. Well everyone but Abrams laughed, he was a guy that never liked jokes at his expense.

“You’re an ass Jake!”

“Let’s put it to a vote, all in favor of Safety Boy and the Cancer Club say ‘aye!’”

A resounding ‘Aye’ came from the group, all except you-know-who responded.

“Sorry brother, the vote stands!”

We spent the next 3 weeks in class and in study sessions without much of an incident. But as our group progress report presentations and demonstrations came up, I saw Abrams get more and more angry every time I repeated the group name in front of the class. It was as if he was building up explosive energy, ready to burst.
He caught up with me after class one day, fed up and ready to strike.

“Jake, we need to talk about the group name, man!’

“What’s wrong with it?” I looked at him with a furrow of worry on my forehead, feigning concern.

“I don’t want to be referred to as ‘Safety Boy’ anymore!”

“Alright kid, here’s the deal… A few of us are going to a party Friday night, if you can prove to us that you can relax and socialize without getting in a tizzy, I’ll put up a vote to have the name changed…”

“What’s the catch?” Anyone who knew me more than 15 minutes knew that there was a catch.

“If you can’t prove to us that you can unwind, even for a couple hours, we keep the name and you never bring it up again, deal?”

We shook hands, sealing the deal. I was one hundred percent certain that this was the last I would ever hear about changing the name.

The party that Friday night just so happened to be an engineering meet-and-greet of sorts. The only people invited were from the college of engineering and mines. The first impression that most outsiders get would be wrong. You would assume that this group of intelligent young men and women would be some of the most clean cut, sophisticated, well behaved students in a university.

This happens to be the most ill conceived preconception that I have ever heard.

In truth, I have never seen a bigger group of alcoholics, smokers, potheads, cokeheads, caffeine addicts and tweakers in my life. And if you think about the life of an average engineering student, it makes perfect sense.

To graduate with the proper amount of credits in four years, an engineering major must carry an average of 16 credit hours a semester. Most of these students work part to full time, trying to pay for classes, housing, food, and the like. Add on the fact that the classes that they take consist mostly of high-end math, physics, and chemistry, and you have a 18-22 year old ready to explode.

My personal formula was caffeine during the day and night to stay awake for class and studying, cigarettes between classes, and beer and cigarettes Friday and Saturday nights to relax. Everyone I knew, regardless of major, had some sort of way to cope with the stress load school put on us. Non-smokers became smokers, non-drinkers became drinkers, and the ones that didn’t find a way became volatile, such as Abrams.

There were 6 of us that rode together to the party that night; Abrams, Joe, Steve, Olaf, Danny (Joe’s roommate) and myself. Danny drove us; he was just as curious as the rest of us how Abrams would act outside of his element.

We gathered just outside of the house and I gave the kid a little pep talk.

“Kid, all you have to do is relax, have some fun, drink a beer or two and meet some new people.”

“Ok…” Shy and timid, Abrams looked like we were throwing him into a lion’s cage.

“Have at it brother!”

I patted him on the back and sent him in the house to mingle. Truth be told, I wanted nothing more for him than to relax and have some fun, but deep down, I knew it wasn’t going to happen.

The rest of us stood outside on the front porch of the house, observing the no smoking (cigarettes) policy the homeowner had posted on the front door. As we killed our smokes and put odds on whether or not Abrams was actually going to follow through with this deal we had, some kid tapped me on the shoulder.

“I’m looking for Jake.”

“I’m Jake.” Having never seen the boy before in my life, I looked at him rather puzzled. He returned the look.

“You’re Jake Diaz?”

“Yes sir…” I said, still a little puzzled, but interested in what he was wanting from me.

Before I could get out a ‘What do you need, kid?’ he slaps a five dollar bill in my hand and walks into the house.

Confused, but not wanting to look a gift five-bucks in the mouth, I let him go in and continue the conversation I was having with my friends. Ten seconds later, I get another tap on the shoulder. I turn around to find a girl looking at me.

“Jake? Jake Diaz?”

“Yeah, wha-” I am now more confused than ever.

She slaps another five bucks in my hand and walks into the house, not saying another word.

I turn around scratch my head, and try to remember who these people were and why I decided to loan them five bucks each. Before I could continue my conversation, I hear my name.

“Jake!”

I turn around to find a rather tall, lanky, pale white kid in my view. He hands me a five and asks me a question.

“Alright braw, where are the cups?”

“What in the hell are you talking about kid?”

I happen to glance around him to find seven more people waiting behind him with money in their hands.

“You’re Jake Diaz, right?”

“You wanna see an ID?”

“This is your place, right?”

“No, dude, I live on campus…”

He grabbed the bill he just gave me from my hand and headed inside, calling out ‘Jake!’ The line became his entourage, and followed him inside. Another kid tapped on my shoulder.

“What the hell do you w-, oh sorry Paulie.”

Paul was a mechanical engineering major who lived in my dorm. As it turns out, it just so happens that the owner of the house is one Jake Diaz, a chemical engineering junior, who was charging five dollars a head for cups.

I was a cocky, brash kid, but I knew better to think I could get away with pretending to be the owner of the house we were at. I knew that eventually someone who actually knew this other Jake would call me on it, and I was probably going to have my ass kicked.

Ten bucks still isn’t bad, all things considered.

I finally walked into the house, gave ‘Jake’ my (his) five bucks for my cup, and took a quick walk around the house. The living room consisted of three couches, a television set, and a Nintendo 64 with Madden ’98 running, and everyone around cheering the four competitors on. The garage was a makeshift dance floor, complete with a disco ball, strobe lights, a rather costly sound system, and a few couches. There was a three-inch cloud of pot smoke hovering near the ceiling, and Abrams was sitting in the corner, cup in hand, all alone.

He looked how I would imagine Jane Goodall did when she was first trying to fit in with the chimps.

“Dude, are you gonna mingle or not- what the hell are you drinking?”

I happened to glance in his cup to find an odd red substance shaking around from the music in the room.

“It’s clamato, it’s the only thing they had that wasn’t water or booze.”

“Man, get up, get a drink and chill out!”

The next few hours slowly became a blur to the four of us that were drinking. I distinctly remember yelling at Joe for the catch that his Jerry Rice didn’t catch from my Steve Young to lose the game of Madden we were playing at the last minute.

There was dancing involved, unfortunately. I wound up dancing with three or four different girls, but when they are engineering majors, it’s a major crapshoot.

My buddy used to have a theory about women: brains + beauty + sanity = k, k was a universal constant.

After the debacle that was my ‘dancing’, I turned around in the garage to find Abrams sitting in the same spot I left him in almost three hours earlier.

I huddled the troops, save Abrams, for a meeting.

“Guys, guys… what are we gonna do about Abrams?”

“We should smoke him out, dude! I’m sure he would relax then!”

“Steve you friggin’ moron, we are not going to get him stoned!” I knew that he would never resist the temptation to do it again once it let him out of his shell.

“I got it yo! See that girl over there?”

Danny turned and pointed to a below average looking girl standing in the corner, slightly tipsy, all alone. I looked at him in disbelief.

“You wouldn’t! You don’t have the balls!”

Sure enough, Danny did have the balls. He walked over, grabbed her attention, and informed her that Abrams thought that she was hot, but he was too shy to tell her. At this point, we would try anything to get him into the game and having some fun.

She walked over and took a seat right next to him. I have to hand it to her, I could tell that she was trying to start up a conversation, but he was resisting with all of his might. Four of us decided to go into the back yard to have a cigarette.

What transpired shortly afterwards was most likely one of the dumbest things I have ever done.

Standing outside, smoking cigars was a group of three or four guys. They soon finished their cigars and in a bout of alcohol induced bravado, decided to put them out on their tongues. What followed I can only explain as a bout of alcohol induced stupidity.

I grabbed my friends’ attention, took the cigarette out of my mouth, and uttered infamous words that every drunken male has uttered at one point in their lives.

“Oh yeah? Watch this!”

I inverted my left arm, pointing my palm skyward, and proceeded to rub out my cigarette in my wrist. Suddenly confused, due to the fact that the cigarette wasn’t going out, I pushed and twisted it further and further into my flesh, making the smell worsen, and digging the hole even deeper.

Apparently in my drunken stupor, I didn’t realize that the reason the cigars went out almost instantly on the tongue was because they were wet. Unfortunately, my wrist was as dry as a bone, and now had a 3/8-inch deep, cigarette sized hole in it.

After the flesh-searing incident, I was ready to go. All of us save Danny our DD and Abrams had a nice little buzz going on. Which would explain why the cauterized wound in my left arm hadn’t yet begun to hurt.

“Joe, you wanna go find Danny Abrams so we can get outta here?”

“Sure, Jake.”

Joe and Danny come out ten minutes later fairly panicked.

“Dude, he went home!” Joe stated with a shaky voice.

“What the hell do you mean he went home? You mean he took off with someone else?”

Danny looked at me as seriously as anyone has before and said something I never thought I would hear.

“He walked home.”

Now, if this was an on-campus party or a just-off-campus party, I wouldn’t be worried. He may have been a little rough around the edges, but he would walk a little while without getting himself hurt. It just so happens that this particular party was a seven-miles-away-from-campus party.

The five of us spent the next two hours traveling the route he would have most likely taken. We went back and forth, back and forth, three or four times, until we finally gave up.

The next afternoon I was awoken by a phone call and some of the worst pain I had ever experienced. Abrams had called to apologize for his actions the night before, and said that he would stick to the end of his deal, allowing the name. Stating emphatically that he never wanted to party with us again, he was ok being ‘Safety Boy.’

Some people just don’t be the round peg in the round hole, no matter how hard they try.