We all know that everything happens for a reason, and if we didn't/did or say/didn't say the things that we did, who we are would be entirely different today. But many of us can't help but wonder "What if I had done things differently?"
Given the chance, I would go back to high school, starting in the ninth grade. It was a whole new world for me. Most of my friends from middle school traveled to the same school as I did, others went to another. It's safe to say that my middle school did not prepare me for high school. Being a Traditional school, all they were worried about was if the student was in dress code. My very first class my freshman year was Geometry with Mr. Johnson. Students who had taken Pre-Alegebra in the eighth grade would find Geometry to be fairly simple. Guess who didn't take Pre-Alegbra? It wasn't a choice either, to take it or not to. There was a placement test we all had to take in the seventh grade, and those who did well was to take Pre-Algebra the next year. So in Mr. Johnson's class, I didn't really know anyone, and being the shy person that I am, I wanted to stay well into the classrooms' shadow, but we had assigned seats which placed me right up front. I hated geometry. I just never understood it, even reading the examples in the book. The tests were a way to humiliate me because I just couldn't get it. Now I'm not putting the blame on the subject itself, I took the after school studies, and even then math and I did not click. My inability to understand angles, arcs, or the use of a compass would have been well hidden if Mr. Johnson had just skipped over me when asking questions in front of the class. Avoiding eye contact with the teacher did not make you invisible. I learned that the hard way. Anytime he would call my name, I would freeze. Barely were the times I was confident in my answers, so I just said "I don't know." That should have been enough for him, but he just pressed on. "Take an educated guess," he would say. And whatever answer I mustered up meekly made its way out of my mouth. "No, that's not it," he would reply. Quickly looking around the room I would see other hands waving in the air, anxiously waiting to give their correct answer. "Finally, he'll call on someone else," I thought. Nope. Mr. Johnson didn't give up so easily. "Try again," he calmly said. I paused and repeated, "I don't know." Class was only 40 minutes, and I suppose he felt like he wasted enough time on me, and went on to the student with the correct answer. I'd hope humiliating me was not Mr. Johnson's top priority, but it sure felt like it. Whenever I blurted out the wrong answer, students would laugh at me, and talk about me behind my back. One girl in particular made it her ninth grade life's mission to make my first class of every single day a living hell. I remember one time I had weave (yes weave) in my hair as two long braids, parted in the middle. The night my mother did my hair, we both noticed that one side was a little longer than the other. But we concluded that it wasn't that noticeable. Silly us, because the next day in Geometry, we were working in groups of two, and the girl was a few rows down from me neverminding the work. "No, because that side is longer," she said to a safe yet still noticeable volume. I knew she was talkig about me. My entire ninth grade is a blur because of her.
If I could go back time, I would firmly tell Mr. Johnson that I was unsure of the answer to the question he had given me, and that many hands were in the air waiting to be called on. I would have taken action. I would take control and become less humilated, if possible. And I would stand up to my bully, letting her know that she could not break me (funny side note, she requested to be my friend on Facebook not too long ago. I haven't accepted it, nor declined it). But I would have taken action on so many other things. First, I would have studied more and not have procrastination consume me. Perhaps I would have gotten into a better college. I would not "let slip" my crushes names to friends...or to the crushes theirselves. I would have picked better crushes, or none at all, because looking back, I don't know what I was thinking. More importantly, I would have been me.
During my remaining years of high school after ninth grade, I tried so hard to impress the people that I liked and I felt that if I dressed like them (which was hard to do when we wore uniforms), listened to the same music they listened to, or talked like them, then I would be embraced into their circle. Personally, I felt there was no popular group that only hung out with those mirrored to them. Our class president was one of the "cool" kids, and yet I was still friends with him, and I was nowhere near cool. Though he was the kind of guy you'd want to talk to when he's not with his friends, because when they were around, he was pretty much a dick. Yet the group I clung onto were the "punk rock but not really punk rock" kids. They listened to bands (that were okay to listen to back then) such as Blink 182, Good Charlotte, and Simple Plan. Alone I wouldn't listen to any of them except Blink 182, and even then it would be a few select songs. But I wanted to fit in. The middle school friends who I was once close to had now found new friends, and there was no use holding on to the past. I really love(d) these new friends of mine. Four of us in particular, including one who was a grade ahead of us, were in chorus and had what I like to call the best times of our high school career. Looking back, if I had not try to become them in looks and what I listened to, I would still be welcomed by them.
After high school, I tried so desperately to keep the "gang" together, but as another friend wrote in my senior year yearbook, we probably would not see each other because that's "life." I denied it, and try to bring us together in some shape or form. But four turned to three (I was out first), then three turned to two and a half (two of the girls had been best friends since elementary school, then they occasionally hung out with the guy who was a grade ahead of us). Then two and a half became two, as one of the girls relocated to Florida with her fiance. And lastly, two became everyone for theirselves. I'm not sure what happend between the last two, and quite frankly I don't care, for it's not my business. I still love and care for my three "punk rock but not really punk rock" friends. I'm sure they wouldn't have used these labels or even thought of theirselves as punk rock, but that is the closest comparison I could come up with.
I don't think I would try so hard to keep us together if I had know we would all eventually go our separate yet Facebook connected ways. And I would just be me. It sounds like I was being "fake" but that's not how I looked at it. I saw it as a way to connect with someone so I wouldn't be left out. In old cartoons you'd see a football huddle of huge burley men, and the little guy on the outside jumping up and down trying to hear and see what was going on. I was the little guy. Going into college, I tried to find who I was. I didn't really attempt to make any new friends, because I didn't see the point. And though now I hardly see any of my high school friends, I've discovered who I am. Or better yet, how I've changed. I am a lot calmer, certainly a lot wiser, and I watch what I say before blurting it out without a second thought.
As the saying goes, "Everything happens for a reason." And I do believe that because if I had made the changes I would want, I would probably not have my Elliot. But it's hard not to think "What if?" Then again it is very easy to think, "What if?" because there's no possible way to change what has already happened. You can not step into the same river twice. However if there is something you didn't do or say then, time is of the essence. But it won't change how you arrived to the place you are now. It could change the future, it might not. I want to return to school to study communications, but that still does not change the fact that I recieved my paralegal degree first. If you had the chance to go back to wherever or whenever you see changes should have been made, and it meant some of your current situations changed, would you?
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