Don’t Repeat This

The first time I went to a slumber party
was the first time I tried to tell a joke.
I’d heard it at school. I didn’t get it,
but I laughed. I didn’t want to seem
stupid. This joke was on my mind:
“How can you tell if you’re in Mexico?”
The twins ran to tell their mom.
I apologized and confessed that I had
no idea what it meant. She explained
and kindly suggested that I not
repeat what I didn’t understand.

The first time I went to a slumber party
was the first time a group of girls
rejected me, but not because I told
a bad joke. The girls wanted to make
a dance routine. I played video games
with the twins’ older brother instead.
Later the girls said I couldn’t join them
because I didn’t know their dance,
so I returned to the older brother
and the video games and eventually
curled to sleep away from the crowd.