Defining Moments In Your Adolescence
This came up in a conversation w/a friend recently so I wanted to write about it. I can think of two off the top of my head.
In the 6th grade I had the opportunity to choose b/w the geeks and the popular girls. Sixth grade was great at first because it was a new school; we all left our respective elementary schools and now we were meeting new kids from surrounding neighborhoods. Initially, I hung out w/all kinds of kids and there were no clear cut cliques. But as the dust settled from our freshly sharpened #2's, it was obvious who the "in" group was and the rest of us were left to fend for our geeky selves. Yet there was hope for me! We got to rearrange seats midway through the 6th grade and I was asked by two groups to be their fourth person. Group 1 consisted of Jen Golden (scrawny, braces, pastel corduroy pants, turtlenecks w/animals printed on them); Natasha Something (black girl w/braces, smelled kind of weird); and Cheyrl Malone (greasy hair, dirty clothes, liked heavy metal). This was obviously not the "cool" crowd. Group 2 was comprised of Kristina Evans (blond, great wall of bangs, name brand clothing, very thin); Kathryn Lencki (track star, perfectly pegged jeans, very thin) and Lillian Balkashin (really great hair, very thin, and somehow escaped ridicule despite her Middle Eastern background (I say this as a kid who got picked on for being Asian, OK?)). These were the popular girls in my homeroom and I had a choice b/w sitting w/them and w/the geeky chicks. Needless to say, I sat w/the geeks and ended up being ostracized from the popular girls. Looking back I'm glad I did it but at the time I remember thinking that I made the biggest mistake for many days, weeks, and months after making that decision.
My insecurities and low self-esteem can be attributed to one person - Sean Curran. I never knew I was fat or overweight until one day in Art class, Sean Curran wrote on a piece of paper: FAT GIRLS TABLE. He then crumpled this note up and threw it at us. "Us" was me, Cheryl Malone (above), Lisa McNeil, and Ellen Davis. I remember thinking that those 3 girls were kind of chunky but it never occurred to me that I was "one of them." Does that sound harsh? I guess what I'm trying to say is that I never had insecurities about my looks or weight prior to that note. I wore whatever I wanted, I ate whatever I wanted (therein lies the problem), and I never felt bad about what I looked like. It's kind of sad now, seeing that the glory days of being comfortable in my own skin ended at the tender age of 11. I would like to find Sean Curran and knife him, that is, if he's not already in jail.
These two things certainly don't define me but they made imprints that won't ever go away. And although they weren't life-changing and tragic on any scale, they were pretty hard to deal w/at the time and they still cross my mind every so often.
Did anything like this happen to you when you were growing up?
In the 6th grade I had the opportunity to choose b/w the geeks and the popular girls. Sixth grade was great at first because it was a new school; we all left our respective elementary schools and now we were meeting new kids from surrounding neighborhoods. Initially, I hung out w/all kinds of kids and there were no clear cut cliques. But as the dust settled from our freshly sharpened #2's, it was obvious who the "in" group was and the rest of us were left to fend for our geeky selves. Yet there was hope for me! We got to rearrange seats midway through the 6th grade and I was asked by two groups to be their fourth person. Group 1 consisted of Jen Golden (scrawny, braces, pastel corduroy pants, turtlenecks w/animals printed on them); Natasha Something (black girl w/braces, smelled kind of weird); and Cheyrl Malone (greasy hair, dirty clothes, liked heavy metal). This was obviously not the "cool" crowd. Group 2 was comprised of Kristina Evans (blond, great wall of bangs, name brand clothing, very thin); Kathryn Lencki (track star, perfectly pegged jeans, very thin) and Lillian Balkashin (really great hair, very thin, and somehow escaped ridicule despite her Middle Eastern background (I say this as a kid who got picked on for being Asian, OK?)). These were the popular girls in my homeroom and I had a choice b/w sitting w/them and w/the geeky chicks. Needless to say, I sat w/the geeks and ended up being ostracized from the popular girls. Looking back I'm glad I did it but at the time I remember thinking that I made the biggest mistake for many days, weeks, and months after making that decision.
My insecurities and low self-esteem can be attributed to one person - Sean Curran. I never knew I was fat or overweight until one day in Art class, Sean Curran wrote on a piece of paper: FAT GIRLS TABLE. He then crumpled this note up and threw it at us. "Us" was me, Cheryl Malone (above), Lisa McNeil, and Ellen Davis. I remember thinking that those 3 girls were kind of chunky but it never occurred to me that I was "one of them." Does that sound harsh? I guess what I'm trying to say is that I never had insecurities about my looks or weight prior to that note. I wore whatever I wanted, I ate whatever I wanted (therein lies the problem), and I never felt bad about what I looked like. It's kind of sad now, seeing that the glory days of being comfortable in my own skin ended at the tender age of 11. I would like to find Sean Curran and knife him, that is, if he's not already in jail.
These two things certainly don't define me but they made imprints that won't ever go away. And although they weren't life-changing and tragic on any scale, they were pretty hard to deal w/at the time and they still cross my mind every so often.
Did anything like this happen to you when you were growing up?