nighttime sharpens, heightens each sensationI was not a "popular" kid in middle and high school. I was one of the forgotten kids who was neither popular, nor picked on--nothing special. I just was. Not cool, not a loser. Not an over-achiever, but active in extra-curriculars. Smart, but not nerdy. That was me. Average. I used to tell people to "celebrate mediocrity", because people are so often proud to be above-average, and even losers have their pride--but average people? We never get any special attention. We turn out to be the college (but rarely graduate school) educated, salaried, and highly-in-debt middle class of America. But I don't mind. I don't mind not being in the spotlight at all. This little blog is the closest I come to it--and I'm ok with that.
All this is an intro to remembered youth humiliation moment #1: I am harkening back to freshman year of high school; that awkward age where one moment in the spotlight can scar a person for a lifetime. One day, on band contest day, I had to go to my morning classes all dressed up because my time to compete was in the afternoon with no time to change in between. I was in a sun dress/jumper my mom had made. It was white with large sunflowers all over it. It looked nice, but in that "i'm-a-little-girl-in-a-sun-dress" way. It was enough that I had to wear this dress to school, but it was even worse when in my freshman English class, the evil Mrs. Rinkey (spelled wrong to curse the offender) took note--public note of my outfit. *in cutesie, I-should've-been-an-elementary-school-teacher voice*, "Oh Clare, you look so cute today! Stand up so the class can see your nice dress!...Go on! Stand up!" Embarassed, I stood up and laughed a little nervously. I could tell every one was taking note of the fact that my dress was obviously home-made. I remember feeling like my face was going to melt off the front of my head from the heat of my blush. I sat down as soon as I had her nod to do so.
Mrs. Rinkey probably would have no recollection of this event, if she were to be asked of it today. But I remember--and shudder. The reason I remembered this is because today I wore a new outfit to work. I bought everything but the camisole and shoes at The Express, and I know that I looked nice. As soon as I walked in to work, everyone noticed my new outfit. I felt embarassed and mumbled things about not having any clean clothes because I haven't done laundry lately, and that I had just gone shopping last night. I couldn't get away from people's comments all day. To make it worse, there was a guy coming over from a different office for a spur of the moment meeting with me and my bosses. A guy who so happens to flirt with me regularly (even though he has a live-in girlfriend). So then that became the hot topic of conversation in the office. They joked on and on about how I had dressed up for "my man". The joke persisted up to and through the time when he showed up for the meeting. I felt like I was constantly blushing. I blushed even deeper when he raised his eyebrows and turned a little pink when he saw me. It was horrible. BUT--I'm not going to stop dressing nice because of all of this. I'm the only single person in my whole office, so why not? More power to me,
I say.