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August 25, 2005
ugh, angst. feel free to skip.
The mind is so funny. I can already tell I'm going to regret posting this very angsty high school-ish post in the morning, but somehow, it's coming out anyway.
I just finished scanning my photo collection. All of it. Every photo that I've ever taken and still have. In labeling some of these files, I had to retrieve old yearbooks, which, of course, led me to read what people wrote.
There are people who I was sure I had stopped being friends with by age 12 who wrote heartfelt declarations about how happy they were to have me in their lives and assured that we were BFF three and four years later than I remember ever speaking to them. It's amazing. I know I should be laughing at the entire concept of "BFF" right now, mocking it and being all Oberlin-graduate-y about how childish that is. But that's not what I'm thinking about.
There's one person in particular -- I'll call her B for now -- who has caught my attention. I've known her since I was in preschool, and we were great friends all through elementary school. In my mind, that's about when we stopped hanging out. I remember her becoming friends with another friend of mine, A, and ditching me totally. I remember that I kept going to camp and she stopped. I remember that we got to middle school and we had very different friends. In my mind, our friendship ended then.
And yet... I have her school picture -- the wallet size, not the trading size -- all the way through ninth grade, and each one of them has a long message on the back about how we would always be friends. Then there are pictures of her on a family vacation with me in 1996, when I was 15. And more pictures of her, up until my very last day at Armstrong in 1997. How is that possible? How is it that, when my family told me I could only pick one person to come with us, I chose her? I remember our friendship being long over by then...
This has all made me spend a lot of time thinking about what would have happened if I hadn't gone to the arts high school. I don't regret that decision at all; in fact, it's the one thing other than my relationship with Lauren that I'm sure I've done right in my life. But would I still be in contact with these people who were a huge part of my life until I left? Even though those acquaintanceships were completely superficial and based on things like, "Ooh, you have Senor Mertens for Spanish 4th period too!" I just can't help wondering if I might still be in touch with these people who were around during really major life events.
I don't know why, but I have a sudden urge to call people's parents and ask for contact info, or to have my mom get it for me. I added two people on friendster who were childhood friends but who haven't been a part of my life in close to ten years. And B, who isn't on any of those stupid websites, is at the center of my attention right now.
Did I spend so much time thinking about how much people didn't like me that I missed out on having some kind of neat people in my life? Am I being pathetic? Am I just being me? The me that has been missing over the last three years as I've tried to care less to make everything hurt less? Is this leap, trying to find B and all these other people, just what I need to kickstart me back into being the real Rebecca who I haven't been for the last three years as I've let anxiety rule my life?
I don't care if I AM giving this too much thought and sounding all dorky. Maybe things were simpler in high school, even if they did suck. At least back then, we all sucked together.
Posted to Nostalgia at August 25, 2005 12:36 AM