Surviving high school: 20 years later
Posted on November 28, 2004
Filed Under Life
Last night was my 20th year High School reunion. In high school, I was overweight, awkward and geeky (long before being geeky was even close to cool). I was teased a lot and spent most of my time wishing that I could disappear into the wallpaper. I wanted to go to this party to put some demons to rest. I know that I’m not that same self-conscious kid. It’s more than just the weight loss and the fact that I finally got my naturally curly hair under control. It’s about self esteem. I finally got some, and the changes I made on the outside came as part of that.
I wore a sleek black dress and had my [Ouidad](http://www.ouidad.com) haircut and color touched up last week. I had butterflies in my stomach the entire day, remember walking down the halls in high school hearing people laugh at me as I walked by. Last night, I overheard people talking about me. But this time, they were talking about how great I looked! Wow. Everyone I spoke to was nice and fun to talk to, even some of the people that were mean to me all those years ago. No apologies, but I didn’t ask for any. We all grew up. I enjoyed their reaction as they looked at my name tag (with my scary high school yearbook picture on it) and they were amazed at how different I looked. I’m about 40 lbs. less than I was when I graduated high school and I long gave up trying to straighten my hair, instead concentrating on making what I had naturally look the best it could. My night ended with my classmates voting me “Most Changed Female” complete with certificate and a bottle of wine. And when my name was announced the applause was genuine.
I never would have believed that this group of people would have singled me out without it being to humiliate me. To be fair, not everyone was hurtful to me. But no one stuck up for me back then either. Now I understand that my classmates were likely too caught up with their own teen angst to concern themselves with mine. That’s high school. Their vote was meant and taken as a compliment. For the first time I can smile thinking about the hell that was high school. It took 20 years, but it was worth it.
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Judy - How ironic that you and I both looked at each other trying to figure out who the other was! You did look fabulous. I was thrilled you won the award. I’m also impressed with your obvious ability to keep your priorities straight. Fun web site by the way. Hope to see you sooner than 10 more years! Tom
How about a picture????