A Look Back to That Awkward Girl From High School

Last night was a best friend's birthday. Naturally, she had a party to celebrate. For some reason I was extremely nervous for this party. A bunch of people from our High School were going to be there and Tricia was definitely closer to Miss Popular than myself, Miss Invisible/Awkward.

Not to mention that one of the guys is a mutual ex-boyfriend of mine and Tricia's. Another was someone, who in high school, I pretty much despised (he wasn't the friendliest or nicest of people, and he thought very highly of himself). Then there was the best friend of the mutual ex, we'll call him Slaw (I know, it's a weird nickname to give, but it makes sense to me).

Slaw was the ex-fling of an old high school friend that I've pretty much lost touch with. Not only did they almost date, but then, when she was with her very serious boyfriend, she flirted with the idea of ending it all for him, with reason, Slaw is very gentlemanly like, or so his persona gives off. I believe they've lost touch over the past couple of years.

So, I'm getting ready for this party, and I notice, I have a large assortment of creatures in my stomach. I don't think butterflies does it justice, but I think I'll have to go with something like small dinosaurs. I had to stop, look myself over in the mirror, and ask myself, "Why the hell am I so nervous to see people from my past?"

High school was...a strange time for me. I hadn't the faintest idea of who I was, and to be quite honest, I wasn't really anybody. I hadn't let myself open up enough to others, or myself to know the person I am now. Even if the people weren't so horrible to me, I perceived it as such because I was so lost within myself that I underestimated myself to the extreme. In my eyes I was nothing, so why would I have been anything in their eyes?

I wouldn't say college has changed me, but I would say it has helped me discover the person who I really am. You can't change from something to another, if you weren't anything to begin with.

The answer to the question I asked myself, to that dreaded high school girl that stared back at me in the mirror was:

I'm scared because I finally have to show them that I really am a person, not just a frightened zombie, like that of what I was in High School. The fear comes from the fact that they just might hate who I really am, or they might love it, and if they love it, then there's nothing backing my opinion of these people that I've held on so strongly to since middle school. If I'm now showing who I am, whose to say they never were who I thought them to be? This within itself is scary.

Let me just tell you, that all these fears, all these opinions I've held of the people that I barely ever really knew- were completely put at rest when I arrived to that party.

Slaw gave me a huge hug and told me how great I look, one of the guys, a neighbor, shot the shit with me for a while about what we've been up to the past couple years. The one I'd despised gave me props for diffusing a could've-been fight, and I even came to realize what a true loser the mutual ex turned out to be. It didn't help that he was completely wasted and on Zanax and Prozac, all recreationally, of course. It felt good to know that I got somewhere in life, and that looks (pretty much all he had going for him) obviously doesn't always get you somewhere in life.

The party was a great time, and an eye opening experience. I've always had issues putting things that are in the past behind me, but I feel as though this party has finally put the demon that is my high school self, to rest. I can finally go on with life, knowing a little bit more about myself than I had a day before, which, isn't that what college is all about, anyways?