Looking at my Facebook friends list, I realized something…. Over half the people on my list from my high school wanted nothing to do with me in school. In high school, we were protected by the “big red doors” of the building. Once inside those doors, you had your social circle, and those were the only people you really hung out with, straying out of that circle was social suicide.
In high school, I really didn’t have that many friends, hell, even in elementary school, I was one of the outcasts. The same thing about the people from high school goes for the people from elementary school, too. Most of the people on my Facebook list from elementary school wanted nothing to do with me back in school either.
I was on the cusp of misery when it came to my social life from around 5th grade on. I wasn’t a member of any specific clique. I guess you could say I was a pseudo rocker since I was dating a wanna be rocker/skater. I had a few close friends, but as a whole, most Friday nights, I was either working or sitting at home. Pathetic, I know. I didn’t go away for prom weekend, I didn’t go “clubbing” I was a geek who tried to find her place but never really fit in.
Now, though, it is as if those years as an outcast didn’t happen. The people on my list now act as if high school never happened, as if many of them did not ignore me for the entire 4 years. Hell, one of the girls on my list was even involved in an incident where she cheered her friend on to spit in my hair!
They expect that I have forgotten about the four years of living hell, how I was so eager to get out of high school that I have never been back since graduation.
Before the bullying in schools was a huge issue, it was still going on. I am not saying what I experienced was as bad as some cases, but it was happening. I was picked on because I wasn’t just like the other kids. I was different and most of the people in school made me hate getting up in the morning to face another day of classes. To know what was being said, to be told by supposed friends what people were laughing about behind my back, to see the glares thrown my way, the hateful looks and resentment on people’s faces when they looked either at me or through me, without even knowing what the reason for those looks were, killed me inside.
But, now, 15 years later, the very same people who acted like I didn’t exist, are requesting to be my friends now. I can’t help but think, in the back of my mind, that they are still in high school, looking for the easy target. But, still wanting to try to see the good in everyone, and thinking people can change, I accept their friend requests, knowing that they probably have not changed.