Jeff! Sooo many gurls with _ _ _ hair at grad!! Too bad.… Hee… Don’t u just love all the flash movies on our site?!? I’m sure U love them soooooo much! U hafta get back into sc man!! We need more ppl to play with! Hmm… wut do u think of the cartoons on our site?? There suppose to be me and teresa, her hairs colored _ _ _!!!! Don’t get any wrong ideas, or else i’ll have to do a lot more photo editing!
I found this shout-out from an old website of a friend. He made it in the last year of high school, which was a long time ago, seeing as how it’s been ten years.
The blank word is red. Yep. I went through a looooooong red hair phase with the girls. Not that it’s really over, as red hair is still a preference, only more subdued. And “sc”, that stands for Starcraft, which was a big game with everyone in our clique. We would go home after school, sometimes to each other’s houses, and battle each other online. We’d even go so far as to create scenarios of different units facing off against each other to analyze how effective they were in different situations.
It’s strange to read these words, because I was never really popular in high school, and certainly not popular enough for someone to give me props. Actually, I was a loner (which is why I got along with John, who was another loner) until the very last year when I changed schools, and met people who were a little more like me, and less offensive.
I don’t know why I enjoy old memories like this, or why they affect me so much. Maybe because I’m an introvert. It’s said that introverts go back to memories for stimulation. I’ve always found a distinct pleasure in reminiscing about old times, when I may have been more damaged, but more innocent too. It’s like innocence is the only thing you have no control over losing. As you grow older, you learn more about how the world works, and a once naïve optimism is replaced with the cold, hard realities of life.
You think of how nice it would be to have the mind of a child again, when your biggest worry was what to wear and whether she likes you, but you can never go back.
I never had much of a childhood. I look back at my years in high school and find only the bitter hatred and loneliness that drove me to reach for where I’m standing now and more. If there was any innocence, it was obliterated long before the later years of high school.
I never had any kudos from my peers, any notice, any attention. My biggest concern then was how to best make sure I get back at all the people who thought me the loser. A thought that still permeates till today.
Maybe you are better me. To which you look back at those days with some fondness. Whereas my anger, it still eats at me sometimes even if I don’t show it. I’ll always be trapped in the shadows of that past.
I was quite dark and pessimistic in high school too. But that mindset was still naïve in a way, and I suppose that’s what I wish I had now. Sort of an ignorance being bliss type thing.
I used to want revenge on those who branded me as a loser too. But then I realized that we have a different set of standards to measure success, and that I could just as easily judge them to be losers based on the things I feel important.
I certainly don’t look back on the days with fondness; just the innocence.
I had a yearbook page like that in which a friend gushed and scribbled a whole page that was gleeful and wow you were so GREAT in that talent show and blah blah and went on and on. I thought it was just V. being V. at the time.
Years later I learned he was not only being himself, but he was a really OUT queenish gay guy. Wow, who knew? I thought. There’s so much behind us all that doesn’t come clear until later.
As for you, I can hardly imagine you having existed in the world that passage mentions. It seems so unlike you. Although I know you’ve a fun side. But you’re so much more zen than all that. Taoism, I guess, and just… time.
It’s funny you should say that it’s hard to imagine me in such a world, when I still play games quite regularly with John, sometimes the same old games from high school. And the whole zen and Taoism beliefs I hold important because they’re not natural to me. I need them because they guide me, not because they are me.