Isn’t it interesting how a few words in a conversation can stimulate your thought processes?
Yesterday this happened to me. Yeah, I know. Stimulating thought processes? Shouldn’t these happen regularly? Not for a non-thinker like me. I dare not tread in those waters too often. Doesn’t take much for me to drown.
Anyhow…
After telling someone about joining Facebook, the person commented that they had no desire to catch up with high school acquaintances.
I began to wonder why I did not feel the same way.
My high school years were not fun for me. Technically, a person is only in high school for grades 9-12; however, in my small school, seventh through twelth graders attended school in one building. Although you didn’t necessarily have class with the upper classmen, you were still walking down the hallways with them…even eating lunch at the same time as them, although definitely NOT at the same tables.
So, I consider grades 7-12 my high school years.
They were, at times, traumatic.
Sure, I know. I’m not the only one who probably feels this way. In fact, I’d venture to guess that every single person has some pretty bad memories of that time of their lives.
As the new kid in town, I never felt like I really fit in. Most of the kids had gone to school with each other since kindergarten. There were well-established cliques that were very difficult to break into. Some of them were based on which town you lived in. My school was comprised of students from a number of very tiny “towns.” I think there were a couple of buses that transported kids from the towns farther away, but for the most part, parents drove their own children to school. This made after-school get-togethers pretty much non-existent if you didn’t live in the same town as another friend. You couldn’t exactly walk down the street to their house, given the rural location. I think this contributed to the formation of certain cliques.
Add my lack of confidence and a series of very bad hair cuts to the mix, and it was a combination that doomed me.
I’m sure my lack of maturity, as well as that of my peers, also had something to do with those bad years. I wish I knew then what I know now. I wouldn’t have spent so much time worrying about what people thought.
Regardless, it was a lonely life.
Growing up and moving away was very therapeutic for me. I gained a lot of confidence through the various jobs I held. Focusing on my children has helped me to look outward…away from myself to others. There is so much about me that is different from my youthful days.
Time and distance has had a way of helping me to forgive and forget some of those hurts that happened on a daily basis way back when.
That’s why I am so excited to reconnect with people. I am really curious to see what everyone made of themselves. I want to see how they’ve changed, and I want them to see how I’ve changed.
I read an interesting comment in this week’s People magazine. Some superstar said that she couldn’t believe how religious some of her friends had gotten over the years, given what she knew they had done in high school.
Isn’t that the neatest thing about growing up? The fact that you can change.
That is what I find to be the neatest thing about this Facebook experience.
Oh sure, maybe I’m not really getting to know these people again. Perhaps we’re all putting our best foot forward. To some extent, it’s still superficial. However, I can’t ignore that part of my life. It had such an affect on me and who I am today.
Anyhow, I’d like to think of it as a fresh start…meeting these people again with a mature outlook on life, various life experiences under my belt, and an eagerness to let the past stay in the past with a desire to move forward, sharing that commonality of a shared era of time that others who didn’t know us “back in the day” wouldn’t understand.
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