We moved when I was twelve. It was exactly the wrong time; had it been earlier or later I would have been the person I had been and the person I would become.
But then I was shy, scared, devoid of humor and personality. When a girl told me that she’d beat me up if I looked at her best friend’s boyfriend who was looking at me, I believed her. Went home and seemed to gain 35 pounds over night.
I realized later that she was paying me a back hand compliment of sorts. I was competition. Without a best friend to mull this over with, and being scared as we had moved from a middle class area to an affluent one, I was clueless and remained in that state for way too long.
I was never friends with the mother of the girl I talked about in my last post. She lived down the block and at any stage of my life we might have been good friends, as most of my friends were similar to her in looks and personality.
But I was deeply depressed and mute. Instead of helping me, the teachers led the teasing. I discovered how cruel life could be. Except for my parents, everyone assumed I was a fat stupid slob. I did nothing to change this impression.
Then a zillion years later I turned fifteen and became “pretty.” I still lacked basic social skills that I had known until seventh grade. But I no longer felt so alone.
Life became great once I went to college and it kept on getting better. Then it went downhill; now it’s back to almost excellent and keeps on improving.
Blogging is cathartic to me; but at times it becomes discouraging. Why am I doing this? Do I want validation about my past? Do I want validation about my writing? Validation for my political views? I can go on…..I’m just not sure why I’m doing this but I can’t stop. (Addictive personality)