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A Valentine from the Weird Girl
That’s me, at age 12, with hair too big to fit into a ponytail and an awkwardly chubby body that few fashionable outfits could cover or even forgive. They called me the weird kid, at school, and they weren’t necessarily wrong. At that age, I collected pins from US presidential elections, would rather talk to horses than people and hid in the bathroom almost every recess to listen to The Doors on my beat-up Sony Discman. I didn’t fit in any of the boxes and at that age — hell, at any age — the people around you can smell the oddity on your slightly panicked breath.
As most kids of my kind, I reacted to the situation by adopting a “screw you” attitude, and that was never as visible as on that dreadful day when popularity and attractiveness was being judged and measured. On Valentine’s Day every year, students would send roses to each other, to be delivered in class on full display to the other students. The popular girls would ooh and aah over the bunches of flowers that landed on their desks, while others, like myself, would loudly declare how silly and obsolete this phony holiday was and how we actively refused to participate in anything from dances to decorations.
Once I reached high school I finally caved, but as the world still wouldn’t comply and my appearance and personality still did not merit any roses, I foolishly decided to send some to myself. The plan was to change how everyone viewed me; to re-brand the weirdo if you will. But the execution did not exactly give the desired result.
On Feb. 14, 1996, I cemented my unfortunate reputation as three red roses landed on my desk for the first time in my 15-year-old life. If it had ended there, things would have been ok, but for some reason I had to get greedy, and add a card to the delivery.
I got held back after class by Eva, my saint of a teacher, who wanted to know if I was doing ok? She had heard the other girls snickering and gossiping about my flower delivery and that rumors had started that I sent them to myself. She picked up the card from my trembling hand and said “you realize none of the boys your age have ever heard of Walt Whitman, much less would send a card with one of his poems?”
And I knew I had been exposed.
I wanted so badly not only to be the recipient of roses, meriting that kind of adulation, but to be loved by someone so perfect that he would know the words of Whitman and place them on that card. As so often before and after that day, I fell victim to my own expectations, and as I stood before my teacher it felt like a horrible price to pay for caring about that thing I had deemed as silly and obsolete.
I see the weird girls around, and I desperately want to tell them that I am one of them. I see their smudged black eyeliner, oversized hoodies and their painted-on pouts and I want to say that the only difference between them and me is that my back is straighter now, all these years later, and that I know it is ok to passionately long for all the clubs that keep you out.
Tomorrow there will be many girls with empty desks, many weirdos without flowers, and I’ll nod and smile as I see them walk back empty-handed from school. Yes, we are weird girls, but that word does not encompass all the things we hold inside. We’re the smart girls, the dark girls, the tough girls, the mushy and romantic girls and all those years of empty desks shape us into the perfectly weird women we are, and for the perfect card to one day find us.
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I’m currently the mother of a 10-year old “weird girl,” and it’s slightly painful to watch her awkwardly navigate through the quickly changing landscape of puberty and the last year of her elementary school existence. Girls these days are far too aware of the difference, thanks to things like Instagram and Snapchat, (especially when they have older siblings using those platforms).
My youngest does not like taking selfies, balks at the idea of boys being anything but annoying, and makes it a point to talk way too much about her anime obsession and Minecraft. Unlike her sister, (who pretty much surpassed the weird girl stage without even realizing it), she is smack in the middle, pretending not to care about all the “romances” popping up amongst her classmates, while still bringing up the 5th grade dance to emphasize how abhorrent it is to her.
In spite of all that, I know she will grow into her full cheeks and long legs not so soon that intelligence and maturity will still trump a skater flop and a Diamond Supply hoodie. That is, of course, my very favorite thing about the Weird Girls, after all. I hope she fully embraces it as she grows into herself the way you have.
This is touching and wonderful. My daughter is 13. She is one of the weird girls. She is obsessed with Manga, isn’t too terribly into boys (or girls for that matter). She is smart and pretty and very tall for her age. She’s 5’8″ if not taller. I’m teaching her about love the way I learned it from my folks: Valentine’s Day is about love, period. I give her my love and make it special. Someday the romantic love will come up and I hope she handles it as well as you have.
Blessed are the Weirdos, for the jocks will end up pumping their gas and making their milkshakes one day soon.
And the captains of the cheerleading squads will take the orders for those milkshakes – and show up at the class reunion – dateless. So it is written, so it shall be.
In one of the Travis Magee novels, I think it was Darker Than Amber MacDonald writes that Travis thinks that life is like a circle around thIn one of the Travis Magee novels, I think it was Darker Than Amber MacDonald writes that Travis thinks that life is like a circle around the camp fire. “and If only I could get in that circle and learn the camp songs and eat the smores then life would be perfect!” Myre tells Travis “Don’t you know we all feel that way?”
e camp fire. “and If only I could get in that circle and learn the camp songs and eat the smores then life would be perfect!” Myre tells Travis “Don’t you know we all feel that way?”
It’s funny how many of the “weird girls” growing up can become the most popular women at high school reunions. You could say they go from being a “weird girl” to an “I can’t believe it’s you!” girl.
Time doesn’t heal all wounds, but it can make for some remarkable changes . . .
My eldest, at 16, is only 5’4″, also loves manga, but is very perplexed by boys. None have yet asked her out, but she keeps hoping. I keep reminding her that she goes to a small school and the field is miniscule, and that high school is rarely a place to find any kind of serious relationship. Once she’s out in the real world, assuming she doesn’t remain a hermit, the game changes entirely and she’ll be able to choose to be around like-minded folks instead of confined to the same people she’s been seeing every day for 10 years. I tell her to look for friendship first.
I think it’s probably good advice to teens that they shouldn’t expect to find the love of their life in high school, but I would also caution parents against dismissing teenage relationships as fleeting. (I know that’s not what you were saying Skip.) The two happiest couples I know consist of high school sweethearts. In each case one of the couple never dated anybody but their current spouse. There may not be a causal relationship at work, but, based on the small number of genuinely happy couples I know, I’m reluctant to dismiss it.
(BTW, if I were to suggest a causal mechanism, it might be related to being happy with what you have combined with the good fortune to find somebody like-minded at a young age. Just guessing.)
Being an enginerd, Valentine’s Day ain’t exactly the highlight of my calendar. My last comment was a little sappy for my taste, so I’m going to go a different route with this one – the mathematical approach to choosing a spouse. I’m going to skip the statistical rigor, mostly because I’m too lazy for any rigor that doesn’t involve mortis, but the statistical reasoning should be easy to follow.
Skipsul was correct to suggest you’re unlikely to meet a life-long spouse when you are young, so why not take that time to figure out what a good spouse might look like. Let’s design an experiment. I suggest dating as many people as you can into full adulthood. I’m not saying you should be promiscuous. (Although, ladies, don’t let me talk you out of it.) The idea is to test the market. You’ll want to get to know your companions, so this shouldn’t be one date and done, but after a few months you need to move on. No marriage at this time.
Then around 24 to 26, you need to start looking for a spouse. This won’t involve any immediate change in behavior, but after each date you’re going to ask yourself, “Is this the best person I’ve ever dated?” If the answer is “no”, you break it off and try again with somebody else. If the answer is “yes”, you continue the relationship. If the answer doesn’t change after a few months, propose.
There is an obvious risk associated with this approach. If you have the misfortune to meet your soulmate at a young age, you’re going to die alone. But what are the odds of that? I could tell you, but that would require statistical rigor, so you’re on your own.
Good luck!
Yes, definitely. I know of a few happy instances of this too. Don’t rule it out, but don’t pin everything on it either.
OK, we need to ping @midge on this. She could definitely relate as she kinda did this.
Annika of Green Gables.
Annika, you were a cutie pie.
And: school is an extremely strange environment. A bunch of immature persons closely matched to us in age, outnumbering the adults thirty to one and confined to a room all day unable to escape, speak or even go to the bathroom without permission, while being forced to abruptly and completely change mental gears at hourly intervals? What else in a normal human life is ever going to even remotely resemble this? “It gets better.” You’re darned right it does.
(I am still happy, every September, because I don’t have to go to school.)