“What would you do if you had your current level of knowledge in your high school surroundings?”
This was the question posed in Renee’s Blog Sparks for February. The journals I was reading through before my last post were around the time I got my first apartment (2006 or 2007). Even though it was merely 4 or 5 years ago, it seems like a different era. So much has changed since then.
Renee is taking me back even before that, back to high school, which was over 12 years ago.
I think if I went back to high school in my current mentality things could have been different, but I’m not sure how different I would want them to be. I could have done the whole popular thing, but I don’t think I would have enjoyed it very much. I had friends from every different group, a few really close ones. I, also, had loner tendencies. Especially when it came to certain things that I enjoyed doing, but didn’t seem to fit in with everyone else with the same interest. I don’t know that I truly fit in anywhere, but my love of performing trumped my need for socialization. I was an only child a lot of my life, I remained my mom’s one and only. Despite that there was little to no time or energy to be put into me, so I got used to being alone and doing my own thing, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. I was fine doing my own thing. Even if no one else wanted to do it or if I wasn’t accepted in a certain world, I would do what I wanted to do anyway, and just mind my own business. I would get bullied and put down, but they couldn’t make me quit. I kept going, but I just kept to myself. I didn’t want the drama, I didn’t want to fight. I didn’t think I was someone worth fighting for, but I loved what I was doing too much to let some jerks run me out.
Now, I am even more sensitive to energy, and with my new found self worth, I don’t know that I would have been so quiet and non-chalant. On the upside, their words would not have been able to hurt me as much as they did.
Being more open to love, I think the dances, especially prom, could have gone differently. Prom was a not so great experience, and that is one thing I always wanted to do over, again, and do differently. I usually didn’t bring dates to banquets and dances. The few times I did, they were trying to hook up with everyone else (it hurt especially bad when my date was one of my best friends at the time), so I figured it would just be easier to go stag and dance the night away with my friends. A few people here a CEA have been talking about me helping to plan a prom, so if nothing else, I can make up for it by giving these kids a great prom.
I am grateful that I was never the kind of girl that needed male attention so badly that I would do anything for it. I think I was pretty much the opposite. It was probably hard for anyone to get too close. I got hurt a lot, so I’m sure I had a pretty big wall up. I’m really not sure what difference my current state would have made in those situations. Although I’ve gone through a lot of healing, there is still hesitance when it comes to letting people in. The good ones have the patience to break through what is left of the wall. Those are the friends worth keeping.
I enjoyed my high school days to the best of my ability. I think the biggest difference would be that I’m ready for college, now and I have grown a little more future minded. I’m content with the majority of my high school experience. The friends I had were good quality friends for the most part. I did what I wanted to do, hung out with who I wanted to hang out with and strived to find happy places and safe zones wherever I could (it wasn’t as easy as it sounds, that’s why I was always looking for them). I did the best I could do with what I had, and for me it was enough, even if it wasn’t for anyone else.
Understanding other people the way I do now would probably affect the way I treated people, or my personal feelings for them anyhow. I now understand that everyone is doing the best they can with what they have and my expectations of someone doesn’t mean that they are willing or able to be who I need them to be. I understand that hate is fear based cowardice. Bullying is the way some people cope with being afraid. Putting others down is a way for people to attempt to hide their own insecurities. Seeing the reality in the way I was treated has changed things for me. Putting me down, bullying me, all those attempts at making me feel worthless really had very little to do with me. It was something within them, and picking on me was merely an outlet. Had I known that then, it could have changed things, or at least my reactions to things.
I’m just not sure that I would have wanted anything to change. Maybe it could have been better, but then, again, maybe not. There are a lot of lessons I might have missed out on, but then, again, there could have been easier ways to learn them, but would I have even been able to learn what I needed to learn the easy way. Odds are, probably not.
All in all, I don’t think high school was a time for maturity and wisdom. It was a time for having fun and being carefree. I wouldn't change a thing. I’m content with the way everything has turned out. I am a firm believer that there is a reason for everything, we just have to find it.
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