Who Do You Think You Are?

Raise your hand if you don't care
What those platinum girls wear
Raise your hand if you're just here
To have a good time

Raise your hand if your lipstick
Doesn't make you a dumb chick
Raise your hand if the shape of your hips
Don't compare to the shape of your mind
You don't even stand a chance
I'm not taking off my pants

I'm here to start a one girl revolution
I'm not a barbie doll, shopping mall, silicone substitution
I thought I told ya
I'm a soldier
And I'm not leaving til the battle's over
One girl revolution

Last night, while waiting for Hurricane Irene to make up her mind about whether or not electricity would be knocked out, I watched The Breakfast Club on Cinemax.  I love that movie.  I have it practically memorized.  It's so quotable.

It made me think back to my own high school days.

I didn't have a clique.  I didn't associate myself with any one particular group of people all the time.  I still don't.  At work, I tend to be drawn towards positive, smart and funny people with similar work ethics, but I have friends from different age groups, gender, sexual orientation and backgrounds.

I don't know if this comes from growing up in a small town or if things were just different at my high school.

Now, don't get me wrong, the "stereotypes" existed.  There were jocks, princesses, nerds, band geeks, techies (the kids who chose to attend vocational technical classes), speds (special education), and druggies (the kids who allegedly got high on a regular basis.)   

I was on the "college prep" track in high school.  I attended "college prep" classes.  One of the strange things about my high school was that if you were on this track, all of the other groups/cliques sort of blurred.  You could be sitting in a chemistry class with a cheerleader, football player, nerd, techie and druggie.  (Yes, we had some druggies who apparently wanted to go to college.)

I had friends in every single category, most of which were friends I had made in grade school and junior high and didn't see any reason to NOT continue to be their friends just because I decided I wanted to go to college.  One of the contributing factors to this was that we had "homeroom" in high school that did not separate anyone based on which group they belong to.  I remember having this guy, Tom, sit behind me in homeroom in high school who was a techie and a druggie and he was one of the funniest guys I knew.  He and I would talk and joke around all the time.  No one ever pulled me aside and said, "Um, Bev, you're a college prep student.  You should not talk to him."

I was also very active in languages, the newspaper and the yearbook.  I spent a good deal of time with people who shared those interests.   I met a lot of interesting people from different groups and backgrounds covering things for the newspaper and yearbook.

When I think back to my social life in high school, a good portion of it revolved around high school sports, as it normally does with most small towns.  If it was football season, Friday nights were reserved for football games.  I always sat with the same people, a few rows away from the band geeks.  I always brought bags of confetti and had a good time.  One of my best friends was the mascot and another was a cheerleader.  I was always running up and down the bleachers, talking to various people.  Despite having an intrinsically shy personality, I was capable of becoming very social when the situation called for it.  Ah, those were great times.  Huddling together, celebrating our football team, trying to catch the eye of some guy, catching up on gossip, telling jokes... 

Then, after the football game, we'd all cram ourselves into available cars and head to Pizza Hut, where we would then cram ourselves into line to try to get a place to sit at Pizza Hut.  I had a crush on this guy named Billy who was best friends with this football player Chris, whom just happened to know my friend Michelle, who was a cheerleader, so Michelle would always try to orchestrate some way for us to share a table or ride with Billy or Chris.  It happened once and I didn't say one word to Billy the entire time.  Ah, high school.  Michelle would always give me a hard time about being so shy around boys.

If it was spring, it would be track and field type activities, with similar post-game activities and socializing.

I don't regret not pigeon-holing myself into one particular group.  It made me, I think, a better person.  More rounded.  More apt to have an open-mind about making friends, getting to know people.  Even dating.  None of my previous love interests are cookie-cutters of each other.

My college roommate used to joke that I could make friends with a serial killer (actually, I think she used the words "axe murderer" which always made me giggle and then when "So I Married An Axe Murderer" came out, I thought it was going to be about me...) because I would strike up a conversation with total strangers at the store, mall, bar, dorm, etc.  I didn't care.  I am curious about people.  I think it comes from being a writer.  Always looking for the story, the angle.

So, as I watched the movie last night, John Hughes hit the teenage angst nail right on the head.  I cried, as I always do, when Brian talks about the pressure to succeed, when Claire admits that her friends won't allow her to be friends with them, when Andy talks about trying to impress his dad, when Bender talks about being abused and when Alison admits that she had no place better to go.  Every single one of those people lived inside of me at some point during my high school days.  

I can't even imagine what it is like to be a teenager these days.  All of the stories about bullying and suicide.  I was bullied from 4th grade until I graduated by this guy Tim and his sister Lisa, who rode my school bus, and who made fun of my weight every single day, every single year, for 8 long years.  I may have hurt inside but I never once went home and wanted to kill myself because of it.  If anything, it angered me into being a stronger, smarter, more successful person.

There was only one time when I was a teenager that I actually did contemplate suicide.  It had nothing to do with bullying and everything to do with my f*cked up family (which is why I often say that Bender was totally misunderstood in The Breakfast Club.)  I wanted to go to college.  I had been accepted to 4 colleges.  I picked the one that was the furthest away from my family.  I was just weeks away from leaving for college when my parents decided that I did not need to go to college.  They held the purse strings at that time -- they were going to be the ones financing my dorm life and my transportation there. I had scholarships, financial aid and work study for the tuition. They just decided that I was not going to go.  I was going to stay home with them, get a job at a local grocery store, marry someone quickly, have kids and just stay there for the rest of my life.  So, I decided that the only option at that point was to end my life so that there'd be no "rest of my life".  I bought sleeping pills and had the letters all written. It really felt like the only option for me.  The alternative was death in itself.

Then, I asked my best friend at the time if she would mail the letters for me.  She freaked out on me and told her parents what I was planning.  Her parents stepped up and offered to take me to college and to help me get on my feet once I got there.  They talked to my parents and, well, I went to college.  I left Pennsylvania and never looked back.  I also did not kill myself (obviously) and that entire experience taught me to that there are always other options.  You just have to look for them.

Wow...  this was supposed to be a light-hearted exposition about how life imitates art (and I don't mean my blog from early July about the fake boyfriend...) and art imitates life.

See, I do have a serious side. :)

Um, so... how about those ... um...  Steelers.  Are they superbowl stars this year?