All you got is this moment / Twenty-first century's yesterday

I was talking with a childhood friend the other day about our ultimate Pads songs. We were loving life in Malibu Musk and powder fresh Always in the late ‘80s so awesomely bad music like Paula Abdul’s “Forever Your Girl” and Phil Collins’ remake of “Groovy Kind of Love” quickly came to mind. But for me it’s hard to beat INXS’ “Need You Tonight” as the quintessential Pads tune. The opening beats of that song instantly transport me back to a humid junior high school gym in the Valley and 100 puberty-stricken girls lazily spacing themselves double arms distance apart, waiting for the “2-3-4” beat count from our P.E. teacher Mrs. Strongwater that signaled the beginning of the day’s aerobics class.

It was during my 6th grade year when Mrs. Strongwater boldly sought to combine her interests in promoting heart health, wearing leotards and being down with the kiddies and choreographed a full-length 80’s-style aerobics routine to “Need You Tonight”. Three times a week thereafter, the girls of George Ellery Hale Jr. High School side-stepped, grapevined and generally schlepped our way through Mrs. Strongwater’s bland dance steps while Michael Hutchins’ insanely sexy voice snarled in the background, “There’s something about you girl / That makes me sweat.” (Get it? Aerobics…perspiration…Mrs. Strongwater was no dummy.)

“So slide over here” – take one step to the right and sliiiide your left foot over to meet your right foot– “And give me a moment” - clap once while standing in place – “Your moves are so raw” – step forward onto the ball of your right foot and swivel your hips in what your 6th grade mind imagines is a raw and sexy motion – “I’ve got to let you know" - lunge backward with your left leg while praying that the person behind you can't see the white (or worse, red!) outline of your pad peeking out through the leg hole of your too-short polyester gym shorts - " You're one of my kind."

And therein lies the rub. At the height of our Pads-induced freakishness, it didn’t seem possible that anyone was one of my kind. To my left was the gorgeous and popular eighth grader who seemed to especially enjoy taunting me during the step-spin-step sequences with her vastly superior carnal knowledge (“I bet you don’t even know what ‘cum’ is.”). To my right, the sullen Latina bad girl who would soon become infamous for tackling Mrs. Strongwater to the ground one day during aerobics and pummeling her with punches while the rest of us robotically continued to sliiiiiiiide over here and give me a moment.

Not to be too hippied-out or anything, but it doesn't seem like too much of a stretch to imagine that the universal experience of young girls getting their periods might serve as the basis for a broader sense of comraderie among us, some sort of affirmative alliance in the face of our burgeoning womanhood. Instead, that time in our lives is marred by such tremendous awkwardness and feelings of intense (and totally unnecessary) isolation. I blame it on the Pads and their fucking overhyped and ineffective dry weave. Although I suppose I could also blame it on Rick Astley. Did anything make you feel more creepy and self-conscious than listening to that guy on the radio (or worse, on a tape your Mom bought you for your birthday)?