Mean Girls

This is not a review of the movie "Mean Girls" (though that is an awesome movie). This is about an incident in my daughter's class that got me thinking about my own experiences with the mean girls.

My oldest daughter is in kindergarten, and I had hoped that we wouldn't have to deal with the Girl Wars until 4th Grade or so. But, apparently they start younger all the time. This is what happened. Adeline started out the year very friendly with a girl, who, for lack of a better word, is kind of intense. The other girl is very possessive about my daughter, doesn't like her to be friends with other people, etc. I actually emailed the teacher and asked her to move my daughter so that at least she could sit with other kids in the class. The teacher had noticed the situation developing and was more than happy to comply. Well, things flared up again recently, when Adeline had a play date at another friend's house. The intense girl got very upset and told my daughter that she wouldn't be friends with her anymore and that no one else liked her. My daughter handled it like a pro though, she told the intense girl "so what, I have other friends, I don't need to be friends only with you." Intense girl started to cry, my daughter went off and played with her friends. I know this won't be the last time that the Girl Wars occur. My Adeline is already at a disadvantage. She's tiny, the smallest kid in her class, at almost 6 years old, she's 38 inches tall and weighs just 37 lbs. She's also got knee length blond hair and blue eyes, so she sticks out in a school where 80% of the population is Hispanic or Black. As a result she's known by more kids than most. Older kids know her by name and talk to her already. If this continues, I know that it will be an issue. The other girls are going to be mean to her just out of spite. But, anyways, this incident got me thinking about my own experiences with the mean girls.

My Mean Girls experience was mostly in the 8th Grade. The town combined the Jr and Sr High Schools, so instead of having both a North and South High, there was just one High School, same as Jr High. The way the powers that be combined the schools was something of a clusterfuck. They unevenly balance the "teams," at least in the 8th Grade. Two of the teams were pretty equal in numbers from both North and South (but I have no idea who actually was on these teams, they may only exist in my mind). One team was majority South, with a few randoms from North (this is the team that everyone I grew up with wound up on), and the other team was mostly North with a few randoms from South (Me and three others in the classes that I took). I was on this team because the math teacher, Mrs Ciampa was supposed to be the best, and I was having problems with math. My Mom requested specifically that I be put on this team, setting me up for a sucky year. In addition, I had to take "Reading Skills" that year. But I screwed myself on that one. I kind of just filled in all C's for the reading assessment test at the end of the year before (Reading Skills was interesting, we read some pretty questionable stuff. Some Ray Bradbury stories that I now appreciate, but were pretty deep for 8th graders).

The 8th grade school year starts and I have No One in my classes that I'm friendly with. Not a single person. All of the girls in the class it seems have been together for years. One girl in particular seems to have it out for me (ironically, she'd become one of my better friends and we'd live together in college, but I digress), and is the biggest bitch in the world to me. No one talks to me, no one walks to classes with me. Nothing. At least I had people to sit with at lunch (Sandy and few other girls, including another one named Sandy if I remember right). It sucked, and I was miserable for the first three month of school. Finally, in mid-December or so a new girl came to the school and it was at last someone to at least talk to. It was easily the most angst filled time of my life. Sure, things improved once I had a friend (Thanks Melody!) in my classes. They really didn't get better until 9th Grade when at least I had Jessica and Heidi in my classes. But by then, I had built up this brittle shell around me and had a hard time making friends. I didn't speak much in High School at all. I should have. I would have, if I could have ever relaxed. I was always on guard, thinking that people were talking about me. Which is total crap. No one even knew I existed.

As an adult, it's hard for me to just go into a group setting and start talking to people. It was better in college. I kind of reinvented myself and realized that I really didn't care what people thought of me. I know who I am, and that's all that really matters. Take me at face value or take the time to get to know me. I'm a decent person. I'm funny. I'm quirky. I know tons of obscure trivia that makes me very useful in Trivial Pursuit or Jeopardy.

I'd like to apologize to anyone that I was a Mean Girl to. If I hurt you, bitched you out, or pretended you didn't exist, my bad. It was just my way of coping.