Colors of High School

As a freshman the idea of high school with guys four years older than me was enough to make me pee my pants. Senior girls were the terror of my life with their big chests, big hair, and big voices. If they spoke to me, it could be fatal. My looks were no where to close to the Barbie dolls they were imitating. My friends were few, but we were a close knit group, traveling the halls with our heads hung low in fear of retribution or separation from the group. We were the essence of paranoid, in our dart-y eyes and scuttling walks.
Sophomore came and went and I relaxed, but it wasn’t until my junior year I began to explore the word, “eclectic.” A contest sprang up between a few of my now many friends and I in our weirdness to see who could become the supreme eccentric one. It was a novelty to look around our lunch table and see who was wearing the most bizarre shirt, who had the oddest eye shadow/hair color, who had the best lofty air about them. In the mornings we would sit in a corner of the cafeteria and discuss our philosophies on life and love, interpret dreams, and poor over our psychology books. During breaks in between classes other kids would avoid eye contact with the “new age children” and when they did talk to us it was in a sarcastic tone saying things like, “Nice, um…what is that thing you are wearing?” Looking back, I realize we came off as strange more than stuck up, and depressed more than distant.
Eventually the leaders of our gang had to graduate and the upcoming seniors were left to take over. We were much more sensible and cost efficient when it came to the brand of our gang resulting in us becoming the, “be yourself idiots.” It went over beautifully.