Light the corners of my mind

On to that second decade of life--and what a rich decade it was, with so much material to choose from. The hard part here is going to be narrowing down those memories to a mere ten.

1. My parents divorced when I was ten. I have many vivid memories from that time: the night that the rose-colored glasses shattered, and I suddenly realized that my parents weren't happily married...the first time that I saw my father cry...breaking down into tears in the middle of my 5th grade class as I was trying to process what was happening. I won't go into all of the details that I remember, because, well, divorce isn't pretty. It just never is. (I thought I'd get the heavy one over with first.)
2. I remember being teased mercilessly by other girls in the locker room when I got my first training bra in 7th grade. "Why are you wearing that--you don't need a bra." "Are you just trying to cover up how flat you are?" "You probably just got one 'cause some of us did." Yeah, I think this one falls under the category of "If they could see me now..."
3. I was so happy to change schools after 7th grade. At BBS, I was an enormous nerd. Braces, permed hair, puff-paint t-shirts, awkwardly tall and lanky, teacher's kid. I was the girl that was only "popular" in the sense that everyone else wanted to copy my homework. I was so ready to get out of there, and to have the opportunity to transform myself into someone new.
4. I adored high school. No really, I LOVED it. I know a lot of people who would rather forget their high school experience, but I think of it fondly. I loved the school, I loved the teachers, and I had a phenomenal group of close friends. That's probably more of a fact than a memory--but so many memories from my teenage years are tied to that school and those friends.
5. In my high school biology class, we had to dissect fetal pigs. I remember having to crack open my little baby pig's mouth and break his jaw. This experiment also inspired my first step toward vegetarianism. I would go to the lunchroom after class and see the ham that they were serving, and all I could smell was formaldehyde. No pork products for me after that.
6. I had four wrecks between the ages of 16 and 18. The worst was the last one--a head-on collision that completely totaled my Ford Escort. I had just met a friend at Big River Grille for dinner, and since I wasn't too hungry, I ordered the soft pretzel appetizer as my meal. After the crash, I remember thinking, "Man, that really would have sucked if my last meal on earth had been a couple of pretzels."
7. For one of my birthday parties, we rented out the clubhouse at my dad's apartments and had a big bash. We actually got the cops called on us, because we were having a particularly heated game of "testosterone vs. estrogen" volleyball. Not sure why, but our group of friends did a lot of group activities like that--"testosterone vs. estrogen". Probably because we were dorks.
8. Destin was a very popular vacation destination for Baylor-ites. One one trip (not sure if it was sophomore or senior year), a few of us were really stupid with the sunscreen. Two of my friends positively fried the tops of their feet and could barely wear shoes, and I managed to put sunscreen on my stomach and back, but missed my sides. For almost 4 years, the skin on my sides was darker than the skin on my front and back. It looked like I had a skin disease.
9. My freshman year at Vandy, three of my friends and I drove down to Sewanee for Fall Party Weekend. I realized what a crazy weekend it would be as soon as we walked into the ATO house and saw a parent--not a student-- hanging from the rafters. Lots of other memories from that weekend, but I'll keep those to myself.
10. I got my first tattoo when I was 18, at TJ's Tattoos in Chattanooga. It didn't hurt as much as I expected it to--I equated it to an extended bee sting. My parents had no clue, and I tried to keep it hidden. I succeeded until my mom walked into the bathroom one day when I wasn't completely dressed and spotted it. She said, "You realize that's permanent, right?" And I said, "Yes." And that was that. It went much better than I anticipated.

As I am going back and reading these, I am thinking that I need to go through some of my old albums and see if I can't find some pictures to accompany these memories...