I hopped on the Long Island Rail Road yesterday to meet up with my aunt, uncle and young cousins, as well as my visiting grandfather (in from Florida with his wife), for an over-large pre-Father’s Day steak dinner. At some point post-meal, discussion veered towards preparations for my cousin Brandon’s fast impending bar mitzvah, which led to the whipping out of my own bar mitzvah video, something I hadn’t seen for years and years. My immediate discoveries:

1. Apparently I was a seventh-grade rock star. Way to shake your booty, 13-year old me!

2. Braces and a bowl cut are perhaps not my best look.

3. Laura Friedman, however, (my girlfriend at the time and an 8th grade ‘older woman’ to my 7th grade self,) still struck me as a hot little number.

After a full half hour of watching the younger me in action, I could basically conclude that, aside from having picked up about a foot of height, I’ve changed dangerously little in the intervening ten years.

Sorry mom, I guess this isn’t just a phase.