13-year-olds. God love 'em.

 

Cheyenne is going through her latest and by far greatest phase lately, diving into the black depths of her middle-school soul and becoming, at least for the week, an emo.

 

What the hell is an emo, you ask? I had to do some research on this one. You see, once kids get out of elementary school, they break off into many different groups, and in those groups, there are many different categories and sub-categories, and Cheyenne? Is dangerously close to the bottom of a little family tree I like to call "The Freaks."

 

Let me break it down: In the Freak Family, you have soft-core freak and hard-core freak classifications. For instance, soft-core freaks include your average band geek (who can flit back and forth between the Freak family and the Nerd family), and Punks (who are freakish, no doubt, but are bad-ass enough to hang with the popular kids from time to time). Some examples of hard-core freaks are Goths (obsessed with celtic crosses, black lipstick, and dog collars) Vamps (who have officially taken it--whatever "it" is--too far), and perhaps the most angsty of all the teen groups: The Emos.

 

Emo stands for emotional (ie, "an emotional wreck", "full of emotion", "EMO, MY ASS", etc., etc.) Emos can wear all black, or they can dabble in other colors such as gray, dark gray, navy blue, blood red, and maybe, if they're feeling froggy, eggplant. Emos (both male and female) go heavy on the black eyeliner. Hair is worn either stick straight all up in the face, or greased up in a grungy little frizzball under a (gray, dark gray, navy blue, or eggplant) beanie. Emos write poetry about hating life and loving death. Emos listen to Green Day, Evanescence, and My Chemical Romance, even though less than a year ago they were totally into Aly & AJ's "Walking on Sunshine". Emos don't care that their stay-at-home mommy drives them to and from school everyday, gives them healthy snacks when they get home, and buys them those $40 black converse sneakers they just had to have. Emos talk to each other about cutting themselves. They swap suicidal ideas and they only laugh when someone makes a joke about running over a cheerleader.

 

Some emos need serious help.

 

Here are some things you could say to make an Emo mad. Not that you would want to make an Emo mad. Because then they'd have to stop sulking and muster up the energy to pout and perhaps speak. Nevertheless: