I had a hard time even with elementary school. I hated it, period. When it came time for school to start, my anxiety went through the roof. I had major separation anxiety when it came to leaving my mom. I wouldn't go as far to say that I was anti-social, I just didn't feel comfortable starting a new school year and not knowing what lay ahead. I will never forget the day I had a breakdown right out front of Marbrook elementary school. I was seven years old. My mom was dropping me off and I did NOT want her to leave. I started crying uncontrollably and I was literally hanging onto the car as she tried to pull away. Now that I think about it, she was probably as upset as I was seeing her in child in that state. The principal brought me to her office to try and calm me down. I remember her getting down on her knees in front of me as I sat in the chair gulping in air and trying to stop the tears. She explained to me that if we didn't know what was wrong in there (pointing to my middle), then we couldn't fix it. The problem was that I didn't KNOW what was wrong. Again looking back, anxiety was the problem. But back then, children didn't "have" anxiety. Or ADD or ADHD or behavior problems that were "diagnosed" by the family doctor. So I just had to deal with it.
Fourth and fifth grades were somewhat tough as well. My separation anxiety had diminished considerably, but that was when the cruelty of other children started to come out into the open. When I was nine there was this boy who liked me. And I could never understand why he did the things he did. One time he pinched my ass and I nearly had a heart attack. While walking to our buses one day, he snuck in a kiss on my cheek as he was turning to jump onto his bus. Another heart attack! I can't remember if we ever declared ourselves "boyfriend and girlfriend" but I do remember when he turned mean when we were in fifth grade. He would make fun of me so bad, and not the kind of teasing that boys do when they like girls. He actually had the nerve to tell me I needed to shave my legs and my mustache on the playground during recess. I WAS TEN! I went home that day and announced to my mother that it was time for me to start shaving my legs. Even my so-called best friend at the time would feel the need to be mean to me and I never understood why. (Needless to say we drifted apart, but by the time we hit high school we had put everything behind and we are still friends to this day.) One day sitting in class, a girl got in my face and kept telling me that everybody hated me. "No one likes you. Everyone hates you." And she just kept repeating it. She was doing it quietly but menacingly. Here I was, this shy little nerd, with a girl telling me this bullshit. She can kiss my ass now, right?
Middle school was especially challenging. My school picture from the sixth grade came back to haunt me at my high school graduation, thanks to my aunt who enlarged it, put it on a huge, brightly colored posterboard with the words "Diva Dana" painted above it. I still have it. That was the year of The Haircut too. I let the same aunt chop off all of my hair in a cut that was supposed to be styled after Demi Moore in Ghost. Not so much. I looked a boy, plain and simple. I was made fun of all the time, mostly because I didn't really care to keep up-to-date on all the latest trends and what all the cool kids were wearing or doing. I had no chest either, and sixth grade boys are just plain heartless when it comes to that shit, especially when your best friend had already starting blossoming, gotten her period, and wore a B cup. I wore baggy clothes because I so self-concious of my body, but when I look back, that just made it worse.
By the time I started seventh grade, my hair was starting to grow out, but I still had the glasses and the braces. And the chubby cheeks. That was when the grunge phase was big. My "new" best friend (who still holds that title to this day) and I lived in flannel tee shirts and ripped jeans, thought Kurt Cobain was a god, wore combat boots and spent most of our time in her basement listening to Silverchair, Live, Soul Asylum, Soundgarden, The Lemonheads, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and Alice In Chains. We would crush on boys that were also grungy, had long hair and attempted to be "rockstars," which was a joke anyway because, well, we were only 12! Never was the feeling mutual. I got my period in January of that year, three months after my best friend, and it was hell. It added even more self-conciousness to this already awkward adolescent girl trying to find a way to break out of her shell.
During the summer before eighth grade, things started to get a little better. I learned that I could wear shirts that showed off my figure a little bit, but I was still all about the ripped jeans and flannels. I refused to wear makeup because I thought it was a waste of time. I got my braces off right before school started, and started wearing contacts around Chrismastime. The swan was starting to shine through the tiniest bit. One of the boys I had been crushing on for about two years started to become more than a friend. My musical taste had begun expanding, as did my wardrobe and turns out it wasn't so bad being a bookworm. My smarts earned me a place in the National Junior Honor Society. I got myself a boyfriend during the winter of that year, and he was a pretty good catch if I do say so myself. At the middle school I went to, the Eighth Grade was somewhat well-rounded. It wasn't so much a popularity contest; most of the established cliques were open to just about anyone. Discrimination had lessened considerably.
Amy and I before the Eighth Grade formal
It was possible to be friends with the The Rich Girls, The Skater Boys, The Nerds, and the Preps all at the same time. I knew I had "made it" when I was invited to my first cotillion. That showed some serious status. I had my first real kiss that year, albeit during a game of spin the bottle and it was with one of my close guy friends. It was awful! I was totally unaware that tongue was supposed to be involved! When I look back at photographs from that period in my life, they all show good times with good friends.
To summarize high school, it wasn't too bad for me. My tight-knit group of friends managed to stay close, even though a few of us went to different schools. We would have parties and try to get away with as much as we could during freshman year. And high school is a whole different beast. We survived freshman year for the most part, and had alot of fun. We were the ones under the bleachers during the homecoming game acting like idiots. I joined the swim team, and even though I sucked, I stuck with it for three years. I started experimenting with makeup and my sexuality had started to develop bigtime. I discovered masturbating (!) but learning that it was completely normal was still a long way off. I remember one guy who I dated on and off for about two years that I would have given it up to in a hot second. But I was still excruciatingly shy. In retrospect, so was he. Sophomore year was tough, probably the toughest one of high school. My group of friends had started drifting apart, but a few of us still remained close. I remember when our group discovered that one of us, who we thought was one of our dear friends, had turned out to be nothing but a stuck up bitch, and that was hard to take. Petty drama seemed to be all the rage. I didn't have lunch with anyone I even wanted to sit with in the cafeteria that year, and for an awkward sophomore, that was hell. But by that time I was settled into high school life, and had acquired several new friends, so our little group just continued expanding. And we continued to be non-discriminatory.
Sam, me, and Andrea before Sophomore HomecomingCome senior year, I was just about "there." I had finally grown some tits, got on birth control so that my period would stop giving me hell once a month, and learning how to flirt and be good at it. I was still a chubby little dork inside, but I taught myself a valuable lesson. Confidence is percepted only when it is emanated. So I built up my self-confidence little by litte, even if I had to fake it sometimes. Because the longer I faked it, the more it became real. I lost my virginity that year, I had started fooling around with my future Ex, who graduated two years before me and was the object of just about every other girl's affection, I was active in the school choir, making my way up to the Highlander Chorale, a prestigous group of singers that was only open to juniors and seniors, made the Delaware All State Choir my sophomore year, was in various productions the drama club put on, and even had the guts to sing a rendition of "My Blue Heaven" during the jazz concert my junior year. I made the National Honor Society, and in the 2001 Thomas McKean High School yearbook, the sections devoted to prom and graduation were devoted to, well, me.
I was never voted Homecoming or Prom Queen; nor did I recieve any nominations for the senior superlatives. I didn't care. I realized by then that being popular in school didn't mean shit. Andrea, Samantha, Amy, Steve, Shaun, Karyn, Karla, Heather, Dara, Jaime and I all had each other and that was all that mattered.
By the time I graduated high school, the ugly duckling had finally blossomed into a beautiful swan. What my grandmother had been telling me all those years I could finally look into the mirror and see for myself - that I really was beautiful, that I was a special girl, and all my little flaws and quirks only added to my character.
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