Moments of an Awkward Youth Part 3

 “I don’t know what was going through my mind at the time.” I can randomly apply this phrase to just about some event, every year of my life.

For me, 6^th grade became the Ground Zero ashes from which the rest of my life rose. There could be no getting lower. There I was, with my butch hair and my stone-washed jeans with holes in the knees. Not exactly popularity material. Dressing was also not one of my strong-suits. It was very popular back then, to wear your sweatshirt inside out. But me, coming so close, yet so far away, wore a white Toys R Us sweatshirt to school, thinking I would look cool. Unfortunately, the “I’m a Toys R Us kid” phrase was clearly visable on the front side of the shirt, making me look nothing but ridiculous. (My best friends STILL TO THIS DAY BRING THIS UP.) I blame my mother, of course, for buying me the damn shirt in the first place.

I always wanted to be something more than what I was. I definitely had dreams of becoming famous, and as it turns out, the name “Keri” wasn’t going to cut it for me. And so I informed my best friend in a note, that I was changing my name to “TT” which was short for Tori. I have a need to stop here and explain that 90210 had just started, so I loved it. As I tried to pass it to her, our teacher intercepted it and not only did he read it to the class, make me write it on the chalkboard, but he also posted it in the hall on the bulletin board so the other kids could read it! This is how I KNOW that teachers are fully aware of bullying, and sometimes condone and begin it.

Another way I know, is because there were these 3 guys that were the cool guys and they called themselves, “The Brothers”. One of them used to tease my best friends and I mercilessly on the school bus. He used to stand in front of the teacher and punch me right in the face! There was also an incident in gym class that involved about 30 dodgeballs and the whole class, but I’m still sensitive about that.  Now I was a moron, and didn’t know how to fight back then, but I saw this douche bag at a friends wedding a few years ago, and it took all I could to not follow him in to the men’s room and kick his ass!!! But karma came around and took care of him in high school. He was ugly and no longer cool enough to be a “brother”, so he was left in obscurity where no one we graduated with probably even remembers he existed.

As it turned out, Keri turned out to be a completely appropriate name for a female celebrity, and that’s why I can’t to this day, watch a movie with Keri Russell in it. She stole my impending fame and she was a Mouseketeer, which was what I wanted to be more than anything. Fuck Felicity.

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Memories of an Awkward Youth Part 2

I had several things going against me growing up. One of them was the fact that my mother was blessed with 3 daughters, and my aunt, the hairdresser, had 3 sons. My mother had NO idea how to do little girls hair. This is one of the reasons that I prayed for sons. I couldn’t imagine putting a child through the emotional scarring that I endured, just in case I too, couldn’t figure out how a barrette worked when applying it to someone else’s head.

In order to solve this dilemma, my mom made us get our hair cut really short. Really short. Like butch-short. I was still in second grade at my new school, and my teacher who never really bonded with me after the Valentine fiasco, was out sick and we had a substitute. 

Now at this point in my education, I was still a good student. I excelled in English, and my teachers had always adored me. Our substitute was giving a spelling lesson, and one of the words was “orchestra”. I was so excited because I knew it, raising my hand, bursting with excitement to be the first one in the class to figure it out when the teacher called on me, saying “You..um..are you a boy or a girl?”

Now, over the years I have tried to figure out what could have possibly made the teacher think that this was a politically correct way to address a child. Did this lady not realize that kids get made fun of at this age? Did she think I was used to being mistaken for both genders? I have no idea, but I can tell you I am 31 now and this happened when I was about 7, so it kind of fucked with me and still does.

I was so shocked and horrified, I could barely eek out the word “girl”. And this was about the time I stopped raising my hand to participate in class. The substitute would become my teacher later in elementary school, and if you think I didn’t remember this bitch the whole way up until that point, you are WRONG. Needless to say, I did not have a productive school career in 5^th grade.

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Memories of an Awkward Youth Part 1

I relate to both of my kids in different ways, but they couldn’t be more opposite. Maybe it’s my polarizing forces from being a Gemini. Maybe I’m just bipolar. Who knows?

My sons don’t even look alike. One looks like Andy and one looks like my mom. We remind him of that every chance we get, because what 10 year old doesn’t want to look like their grandmother? Their personalities couldn’t be further apart. One is crafty, cocky and popular with the kids in his class, and the other is quiet, awkward and socially inept. Between the two, they cover the evolution I have gone through in life.

I was always able to make friends easily growing up, but I was my own worst-enemy. I guess that part hasn’t changed much. When I was in second grade, we moved out of the city and in to the suburbs. My first day of school was near Valentine’s Day, and my sister was in Kindergarten. I was walking down the hall by myself and noticed there were hearts on the bulletin boards, decorated by my peers. One of them had fallen off the board and was laying on the floor. I can’t tell you what went through my mind at the time, but I thought it would be a good idea to take it and give it to my sister as a gift to tell her I was thinking about her on her first day at school.

Here’s where it went wrong:

I didn’t fully erase the name of the kid who actually made the valentine before I added my own message of adoration. And then I actually took it to her teacher to give to her, whose classroom happened to be down the hall from the bulletin board where the other 30 valentines of the same style were hanging. So, my first day at my new school, I was hauled in to the principals office to explain where I had gotten the present for my sister.

What did I learn from this childhood blunder? The boy whose valentine I stole and had to later apologize to in writing, probably never dated me because of it. That, and use a better eraser.

In all fairness, the same boy, Joe, gave up a recess to teach me how to stand on my head… and a first crush was born. A boy-craziness that lingered, mostly unreturned for the next 10 years. And it took me about that long to start to figure out how to attract the opposite sex.




I was nominated on Babble's Top 50 Mom Blogs List. So pretty please take two minutes and click here: http://www.babble.com/babble-50/mommy-bloggers/nominate-a-blogger/index.aspx then scroll down to "Glamorous Life" and click on the "like" button.
Thanks a bunch!