The Popular Girls

I spent most of my life as a young girl (up through early 20s, actually) profoundly wishing to be a popular girl. I'm not really sure why, either. Perhaps it was because the popular girls were always pretty, or because the boys liked them, or maybe because people paid attention to them & that made them important. The popular girls always had the best clothes, the tallest bangs (this was the 80s), and seemed so with it & together.

I was the completely invisible shy girl who couldn't spend the night on Saturday because I had to go to church all day Sunday. I had homemade clothes and couldn't figure out how to roll my jeans tightly or get my bangs to stand up like that.

When I got to high school, I was still pretty shy, but not as bad as when I was little. I was a good looking girl (I realize that now, anyway), but I had "friends" (read: girls that I hung out with) that were generally accepted as HOT. Even now, in hindsight, I don't really understand why they were HOT & I could not be differentiated from the background. Confidence perhaps. Really, most of them were, well, bitches. They were not nice girls. Very mean and judgmental, even within our clique. A lot of two-faced back-stabbing. The joy I had felt at being accepted was quickly diminished by how catty & nasty these girls really were.

Because I was the "nice" one, guys would always befriend me because they wanted to get with my "friends." When I brought the guy around (never mind that I usually had a mad crush on said guy), they looked down their noses at him & treated me like a bad dog that had brought in something nasty. But, the guys were often persistent (these were teenage guys looking to get laid...they were desperately, sometimes pathetically persistent), & occasionally one of the princesses would cave & he would be accepted.

When I called them (rather meekly) on their behavior, I was cast out. In the senior yearbook, some of them bought "ad" space (where parents post letters, friends post pictures, etc.) & included group pictures from our high school years...with me cut out. A couple of them have since refused my "friend" requests on Facebook. I'm amused at what some of them have become, after looking down their nose at me. I think it's funny that I was always chastised as being "inappropriate" but the girl who couldn't say "fuck" without giggling halfway through (seriously) was knocked up before she was out of high school. There's a lot of irony for me looking back over everything.

I find irony rather amusing.

Over the years, I still occasionally have that pang of wanting to be accepted by the "cool" people. As it has always been, most people like me, but I have very few friends. I get invited to things, but I'm just not into the social, party lifestyle. I don't have anything in common with most of the "popular" people I know and I'm not really into hanging out with people who don't share my values. It's too tiring, honestly.

I think what I have always envied is the perceived confidence the popular girls had. The fact that they never seemed phased by situations that made me embarrassed and uncomfortable. I wanted that confidence. I hate being embarrassed and I hate feeling stupid. Somehow, I got it in my head that these girls didn't feel that way. I've since learned better. That at some point, everyone feels like a dumbass. Everyone cries. Everyone has been humiliated. I just haven't been there to see it.

I like who I am, for the most part. I like that I have 2 or 3 friends that would move heaven and earth for me if I needed it...and I would do the same for them. I like it that way. And after being cast out? I know I don't need them. When life has taken a shit on me, I dig my ass out of the mess by myself. Maybe that's why so many of them have since said "Wow, you're such a strong woman!"