high school

Back in the Saddle Again

Aside ~ ~ lifeontheskinnybranches ~ 2 Comments

Hello, friends!

I sure have fallen off of the blogging wagon. This introvert has been introverting and extroverting in so many ways that writing, well, took a lesser priority. A beloved word prompt site closed their virtual doors, and that also factored into my having drifted onto a different course.

But I miss this. So here I am. Back in the saddle again. Which reminds me…

When I was 15, my friends and I would use our fake id’s and go to this club called Cowboy in Houston, Texas. We went to happy hour, which was $2 frozen margaritas from 4- 5 PM.

I look back at us, and I marvel. The gall. I mean, we were breaking the law. Lying to our parents. Putting ourselves into adult company when we were (obviously) not mature enough to be there.

But boy, did we think we were all that and a bag of chips! We would style our big 80’s hair, dress like what we thought was grownup, and then drink as much as we could. The goal was to talk to guys, of course. We had little routines we followed – conversations we would fall into when we thought someone was overhearing or had come over to talk to us. Things we said in hopes of coming across as college-aged young women.

I wonder now – did we fool anybody? I actually ended up dating a few different men that I met when out and about. Cowboy wasn’t the only bar we frequented. Yikes. What was up with that?

We had a ball at the time. (I think.) It was fun being together. Breaking the rules. High school was such a maelstrom of social pressure. It was great to seek another environment in which to “rule.” Especially since we so totally did not rule in our high school peer group.

At the end of every happy hour, they played “Back in the Saddle Again” by Gene Audry.

Back in the Saddle Again

To this day, when I hear it I am transported back to “the day” when life was happy hours and foolish fun. The time before the happy hours became a problem.

And while I know that even then, I was trying to fill a hole inside with something outside of me that would never do the job, I do remember those days with fondness. We had a naivety that I miss. A foolish gumption. A blissful ignorance.

I could use a bit of that gumption now. That naive action-taking without a care for consequences that I did not believe really applied to me. Of course, it all did eventually catch up to me, as all such things do.

But I do feel a fondness for the me that I was then. And that song always makes me smile.

#Cowboy #youthfulescapades #reminiscing

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History Matters

Aside ~ ~ lifeontheskinnybranches ~ 7 Comments

When I was in high school, I had a very aggravating world history teacher.

He used to do this very annoying thing: whenever a female asked him a question, he would usually say something like this*:

“Patience is a virtue, rarely found in men and never in little girls named fill-in-the-blank with the question-asker’s name.”

*Full disclosure: it has been many years since high school and I cannot recall his exact wording. Also, memory is a finicky thing, and as I recall, he only did this aggravating thing to young women, but I suppose in all fairness he could have said it to the young men. But to the best of my knowledge, he only said it to young women.

He used this phrase alongside many other subtle and not-so-subtle words and actions that made us young women feel like he was a male chauvinist pig, which in my day was a phrase bandied about by some women towards men like my teacher which is how we would have known of it.

We all felt it. He actually pitted the males against the women and listed our test scores prominently on the chalkboard each week: the males first, and then the women. The men usually got the highest grades, which he loved to gloat about. They were always listed on top.

Boy, did that burn us women up. The competition made us all work harder than we might have. We longed to knock the chip off his shoulder.

I remember when one of us finally earned the highest score. We couldn’t wait to find her name at the top of the list!

But he acted disgusted and refused to move her name to the top of his list, which we thought was grossly unfair.

I have thought of him over the years since, never with good feelings. His actions might seem innocuous, but we young women had enough societal images and messages coming at us telling us that our intellect was insignificant and unnecessary. We did not need to have it hammered into us by our teacher.

I happened to Google the words that I recall him always saying, and I found the following quote. While I found a source or two attributed to it, I was not satisfied that those sources were the actual creators of the saying.

“Patience is a virtue,                     Possess it if you can,                     Seldom found in woman,                     Never found in man.”

I find it interesting that my teacher had been so drawn to it that it became a staple in his tools for the classroom. I wonder how he came to find it…it clearly made a deep and lasting impression on him.

Someone choosing to commit their life to teach high school seniors is certainly someone of interest to me. And he was extremely passionate about world history and committed to our education. We all probably worked harder in his class than any other. Maybe he deserves credit for that. He certainly made a lasting impression on me.

Did he prepare us young women for the “real world” or did he merely deepen a dynamic that we’d already had jammed down our throats that we’d soon find further evidence of in college and beyond?

I like to think that a teacher today would never be able to get away with what he did so boldly.

I do wish that he had not been so sexist. His teaching could have been so much more powerful.

Inspired by The Daily Post Daily Word Prompt: patience

Hollowed Halls

Aside ~ ~ lifeontheskinnybranches ~ 11 Comments

I felt the tickle of a trickle of sweat run down under my arm as I waited just beyond the corner past his locker. My mouth was dry, my heart pounding.

It was now or never.

I had to have a date for the dance coming up next weekend, and he was the only boy I could think of to ask.

He was a Kicker, not in the Popular league, so more within my reach. (Me definitely not being in the Popular League or anywhere near it.)

We got along okay, I thought. I sat behind him in history and sometimes we exchanged a few words. He at least saw me. I made him laugh once with my impromptu impression of the teacher.

I spotted his cowboy hat and forced myself to call his name, my heart suddenly full of hope. He turned and came over my way. I felt like my whole life was about to change.

My words tripped over my tongue and landed between us with a clumsy thud, but he got the gist.

He paused for what seemed a lifetime. My heart sank in the silence.

“Nope, I have to say no. But don’t feel bad. I wouldn’t say yes to a dance, not even if you was Susie Moore.”

Susie Moore was hands down the most popular girl in school. She was everything I was not: pretty, petite, outgoing, a cheerleader, funny.

I laugh a curt, self-derisive laugh and say “Oh yeah, of course!” a little too brightly, a little too pushed.

I walk away, my hope around my ankles, the taste of recognition of my non-Susie Mooreness bitter in my mouth. I’d known it already, but having it stated to your face is a whole different ball of wax. Especially from the mouth of your major crush.

Never again, I vow silently to myself. Never. Again.

Inspired by The Daily Post Daily Word Prompt: popular

I read my writing for the first time in a public forum today. It was amazing to share my words live, and to experience the other writer’s works.

Because I was so involved with that, I thought I’d repost Old Baggage for today’s word prompt, but this came to me instead. 34 years later and I still feel the sting. Isn’t it amazing? How intense our early experiences can be?

 

Old Baggage

Aside ~ ~ lifeontheskinnybranches ~ 1 Comment

When I was in junior high school, I begged my parents to go in on a purse that I was desperate to buy.

Not just any purse. It was a Gucci Speedy/Doctor bag. (We didn’t call it that then. I only know that’s its name from researching this…it is now considered vintage! Ouch!) It probably cost a couple of hundred dollars, which was a lot in those days (at least to my family) to pay for a purse, or anything, really.

Everybody had one, or so it seemed to me.

I went to a large public high school, so there was a mix of economic and racial backgrounds, kids from many different backgrounds.

On any given day you would see the many different lifestyles reflected in the fashion of the different groups. Sometimes what a kid was wearing reflected their socio-economic status, but not always.

There were “Stoners” (or “Partiers.”) The “Kickers” (this was Texas after all — so these kids were cowboy/farmer types.) It being the 80’s, there were the “Punkrocker” or “New Wavers.” ( I know, this is beginning to sound like the movie “Pretty in Pink.” That movie resonated for a reason, right?)

It was the height of the Preppy or Preppie craze, and though Houston, Texas was not NYC, we did get the fashion trends, albeit maybe a season or two behind. So the other main group was the “Preppies.”

The majority of kids in the Preppies definitely came from upper middle class to wealthy families. Looking back, for a public school, there were quite a few kids that came from great wealth.

I didn’t really fall into any one group. While my family was white-collar, sort of upper middle class, my father, having come from next to nothing, wanted to be sure that we were not spoiled. We never wanted for anything, but we lived fairly simply in comparison to some of the other kids in my school.

I was never one of the popular kids. I was an outcast until I lost a bunch of weight at 14, when suddenly I became of more interest to the “in” crowd. Though my outsides changed, my insides were the same. So though I was allowed around the in crowd now, I never felt a part of it.

There were others like me. We found each other and created our own group. We didn’t have a name, at least that I know of.

We were sort of mysterious: people knew we had fun going out to clubs and bars and hanging with older college kids. Though we had friends across all the groups, we would hang with just each other outside of school. We dressed in a mix of all of the fashions of the day.

But back to that bag. The bag that “everyone” was getting. I just had to have one. I had some money from babysitting, but not enough for THAT bag. So through the implementation of Chinese water torture on my dad, I promised over and over dramatically that “I would never need to buy another purse again for as long as I lived if I had that bag!”

Eventually, I wore my parents down. I got THE bag.

I have no recollection as to whether or not obtaining the bag actually brought me any pleasure whatsoever. I ‘m pretty sure that the amount of time I actually used it was very brief, much to my father’s chagrin.

Years later, after my Mom died, when we were sorting through some of her things, my Dad reminded me of that bag and that promise. We laughed about it, but I felt a cringe of guilt at how easily I had let go of that bag after having fought so hard to get it.

I think it’s because I really had no connection to the bag itself. Only to the way I wanted to be seen carrying it. The lifestyle to which I wanted to be associated. Which was not reflective of my own style at all, or even who I really was or even wanted to be.

But I wanted to feel like, or to be wanted by at least, (or to be seen by others as being wanted by or as one of “them,”) those popular girls, and so I got the bag. It didn’t make me feel any more a part of the “it” group than I ever had. I was an outsider and I always would be, bag or no bag.

It makes me sad that the girl I was then didn’t feel good enough in my own esteem to have seen that bag for what is was: a status symbol. It wasn’t the bag I really wanted. I wanted status. How I wish I could go back in time and tell that myself that being an outsider was actually pretty cool. Now I know the kind of status I needed would never be able to come from anything outside of my own heart. I wish I hadn’t sold myself so easily and so cheaply.

After my Dad died, I found that old Gucci purse in a box in the garage, where my Dad had kept it for me all these years. It was in mint condition, barely used.

Maybe you are hoping I’ll say I started to use it again. Or that I sold it at a profit on Ebay.

I gave it to the Salvation Army, where I hope it became a found treasure for someone who really wanted it for its beauty. I hope it is being put to good use in the world, as should all things.

Today I carry a very practical Lug Moped Day Pack bag as a purse. It costs about $35.


It’s light, leaves me hands free and has just the right ratio of open pockets, zippered pockets, divisions and space. (As it turns out, I am quite finicky about a handbag’s function, would love to design my own ideal bag, but this is as close to my ideal as I have found to buy.)

I have no interest in designer handbags. I may admire their beauty sometimes, and be amazed at and appreciative of the women who pay for them, love and carry them. But they were never my style and probably never will be.

I can live with that.

#purses #handbags #self-love #Iamnotmybag #theeighties

Inspired by The Daily Post word prompt: lifestyle