What it means when a girl punches you in the face

OK, listen up, son. We don’t have a lot of time to deal with this. Your testicles are dangerously close to injecting copious amounts of testosterone into your blood stream and you’ve unfortunately got the girl sense that I had at your age. Which is to say you have none at all.

Once that chemical gets into your blood, I’ll have lost any chance of having a reasoned conversation with you about girls.

In the name of full disclosure, I should state that my knowledge of girls hasn’t really improved since I was a kid. I am still as confused about girls as a neutered poodle with a penchant for ankle humping. But I’m the grown-up so, obviously, I’ve got lots of advice.

Here’s how I know you inherited my girl smarts:

Me: So Cheeky, who’s this Ella girl you seem to talk a lot about?

You: We’re enemies.

Enemies.

Yeah, we hate each other.

How do you know she hates you?

Well she’s always punching me and stuff. And she wrote this on the back of my neck today.

It says, “Hi Cheeky.”

I know. See? She hates me.

Dude, she totally digs you.

No she doesn’t. We’re enemies.

Um, sure. OK, enemies. Right.

Then your eyes gave me the weirdest look of horror while the corners of your mouth sort of smiled a bit.

Learning to recognize when a girl likes you is a critical skill. If your mom hadn’t thrown me to the floor and kissed me, I never would have known how she felt. (Actually, at first, I was convinced she just tripped and accidentally landed lips-first. I did catch on, though, after about the third time it happened.)

Let’s take a quick snapshot from a typical school day when I was a kid. We’ll contrast two encounters with girls and you decide in each case whether she liked me or hated me.

Here’s the most frequent type of encounter I had with girls:

Girl: (standing 10 feet away)

Me: (staring at the girl)

Girl: (doesn’t notice)

Me: (staring at the girl)

Girl (doesn’t notice)

An hour later…

Girl: (standing 10 feet away)

Me: (staring at the girl)

Girl: (doesn’t notice)

And then there was this girl:

Girl: Hey Barmy. (punch)

Me: Ow! You big dummy.

Am not, stupid head. (punch)

Ouch! Quit it, pig face!

You quit it, dog breath (punch)

Ow. I don’t have dog breath.

(punch) Do too. (punch) I bet you kiss your dog on the lips and that’s why you have dog breath. Dogbreath Barmy. (punch)

Ow. Do not. Ouch! Jeez! Well, I…I mean, I guess my dog does lick me and stuff but—

Dogbreath Barmy! Dogbreath Barmy, shoulda joined the army!

You know that makes no sense, right?

Whatever, it rhymes. Dogbreath.

I know it seems nearly impossible for you to tell which of these two girls actually liked me. But over the years, I’ve learned that it’s really not that hard:

If your typical encounter results in pain, she probably likes you.

So go on out there and take a beating. Revel in the sweet joy of tween love as it doubles you over and, quite literally, takes your breath away.

Damn, I miss those days.