The 17-year old version of myself.
I’ve talked about this a few times in past blogs, but growing up, I pretty much didn’t have any friends. I was hated on by my peers in middle school, high school and the church youth group I participated in, because, well, I’ve always been kind of blunt and profane and I’ve never pretended to like things or give a shit when I didn’t, and my teenage peers thought I was a bitch for it. Which, ok, I might have been, but come on - these girls named a fucking DISEASE after me and told my friends to stay away, I think they warranted whatever epithets I threw their way in response. (And funnily enough, I still use that disease as my email and usernames on sites - kdgsyndrome)
They say that people change, but honestly, I haven’t. At least, my overall character hasn’t. I have always been the hyper self-aware and opinionated person that I am today, and it’s funny, because reading through my plethora of old journals really confirms this. I have always had a really strong-willed voice and have always thought myself better than the trivial dramas I would constantly find myself in throughout middle school and high school.
Here are some gems that I found in the journal I kept when I was 15 - over 8 years ago.
“Is it so wrong that I refuse to compromise or censor myself just to be accepted by lame, large groups of people that I don’t even like?…I’m not one to play or be played with. Excuse me. I have low tolerance for that crap.”
(On some girl fight I found myself in the middle of after mass): “Apparently Kara thinks I’m a ‘biter’ for getting bangs before her, AND LOOKING BETTER IN THEM…Kara tried to justify herself, but really, she’s just a petty, lying cunt who’s never liked me because I do everything better than her. Except maybe in the area of being a dirty whore.”
“But first, I think I’ll elaborate on how lame everything was. Matt was being a dick, everyone smelled, I don’t care about playing the goddamn piano, and the most interesting thing I ended up doing all night was ballroom dancing with Kristel’s almost-boyfriend.”
“I have just taken my last final. You know what that means, bitches? SUMMER FUCKING VACATION, that’s what.”
“Signing yearbooks is lame. More and more I find it to be completely insufferable. A popularity contest of people you pretend to like, don’t really know, don’t really care about. And it’s just kind of frustrating how much emphasis people tend to put on the yearbook’s importance, when in all actuality, most people are just full of shit.”
“Did I mention that we went to LA after school on Thursday, and later we got fish tacos at the Farmer’s Market? I didn’t? Well that’s because it was pretty uninteresting, moving on.”
Reading this over again it’s clear that I was a negative and hormonal teenager, and I’ve obviously reached a happier, stabler point in my life since then, but considering that I wrote those words almost a decade ago, it’s interesting to see that my personality and tone hasn’t really changed that much. I’m just happier these days.