So, It DOESN'T Revolve Around Me? Hmmm...Interesting...Part 2 "Kelly Kapowski, Princely and Me"

Okay, so its pretty clear that the world didn't revolve around me when I was younger. Although Adam has tried to coerce me to do so, I won't tell you about the time my little brother wiped his butt with my favorite socks just to further prove that the world didn't revolve around me. I just won't do it...it would just be too much. But I think you get the point.

But geez, it was so clear to me that I wasn't the center of attention! Yet looking back I realize that at such an awkward elementary/middle school phase it was okay that I wasn't. I don't think I wanted to be the focal point...God still had alot of figuring out to do about what direction He was taking me physically. I had way too much hair for my little head, my extremities were (and are) extremely long and as short as I was my knuckles were surely shy of scraping the ground. My two front teeth faced each other, but that didn't stop me from smiling! My feet were as long as any full grown woman's and I definitely had a fuzz to my face...oh and to top it off I had also acquired the name "Mosquito Bites" as middle school boys cleverly came up with phrases to ruin the lives of prepubescent girls despite the fact that they clearly had struggles of their own.

After countless nights of chanting, "I must, I must..., I must increase my bust!" followed by "the bigger the better, the tighter the sweater, I must increase my bust..." God would later overly vindicate me in that department, but trust me...the names just got even more clever.

So, I told you something changed in me. Man, did it ever. Somewhere between the nightmare that was my middle school career, watching Juan Trujillo and Vincent Stegall (my HUGE middle school crushes) all pass on the above description for cheerleaders and "thicker" black girls, (I couldn't help it I still weighed in the double digits) and watching the very different lives of Bayside High's Lisa Turtle and Kelly Kapowski... I knew I had to change. There would be NO Zack Morris' in my future if I didn't shave my fuzzy face and get some braces stat.

High school was coming up so I went to work. (or at least I tried...I was never good in the makeup/hair department) My brother went to South Garland High, so I naturally followed. The great thing about high school is that it was a fresh start. The even greater thing was that all but about 4 people from my middle school decided to go there. EVEN FRESHER START!

I had officially decided that it was time for me to be cool and get at least some of the world revolving around me. In reality the only thing I actually changed was my clothes since I didn't wear makeup, had bushy eyebrows and hadn't learned any new hair styles. But, fortunately my teeth turned around without braces which is good because 1. we couldn't afford them and 2. braces in high school would have definitely been a step backwards. I also gained a little weight (maybe a pound) and stopped wearing my hair so fluffy. So all in all I was starting to look more like a teenager and less like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle.

But high school was HUGE and I wasn't quite prepared...Everyone was tall and looked like adults. I LOOKED new and confused. I was putting things in my locker after every class, which apparently you didn't do after a certain grade level. I was going to the cafeteria for lunch... LAME-O! and I was in my seat ready to go way before the bell rang... something you only do if you're actually in school to learn. I was in way over my head trying to become the Kelly Kapowski of a school of thousands of people. So I gave up, stood closely to my brother every morning until the bell rang (luckily he actually talked to me most of the time) and headed to class to work on my Helen Keller impersonation. (I literally looked at and spoke to no one)

Here's the good news...apparently every other 9th grader had equally bushy eyebrows and bad hair BECAUSE a REALLY cute boy named Princely (um...I know) asked me to be his girlfriend! Like, a real cute boy y'all! Sort of a Chris Brown-esque boy with curly hair. Even looking back I would still say he was actually cute and he wanted me to be his girlfriend! Forget that I had only said 'hi' to him in the cafeteria like once and the fact that I am not sure I ever knew his last name...I had never had a boyfriend. Identity here I come!!!

So, I let Princely put his arm around me and walk me to class everyday. No more sitting in my seat before the bell rang! I had someone to awkwardly linger in the hall with! I say awkwardly seeing as how I knew nothing about him and hadn't yet figured out flirting, wittiness or even how to put subjects and predicates together to create "boyfriend sentences." Hallway dating doesn't make for the most gratifying relationship, but Princely was probably having some identity crisis of his own and really didn't care that our relationship consisted of 20 minutes of between class interaction a day. We talked on the phone and might have gone to the movies once, but I wouldn't swear to it under oath. Then one day... he did the unthinkable and we had to break up.

People were taking notice of us. Perfect strangers were telling me how cute my boyfriend was and what a cute couple we made and asking me, "By the way, whats your name?" And I liked it! Though high school is the most ridiculous part of life, the shallowness of it all made it quite easy to make (and lose) friends. Not quite Kelly Kapowski, but Helen Keller was headed out the door. And then he did it...he met me at our usual spot before 1st period and had picked his curly locks into....an Afro! Oh no...it was too much for me. For some reason as he walked up smiling I was frowning. I wasn't quite prepared for the 'worst' part of our 'for better or worse.' I was convinced the Afro had gone out of style a week earlier and now here he was cheezin at me with expired hair! To make things even more difficult, my brother came by and high fived him on his new style and I knew that the new boost of confidence would only egg him on to keep his hair that way. So, I had to do it...I had to break up with him.

Here's why...when you are trying to create a world that revolves around you, you only want good attention from the people of the world. Although my brother liked his hair he wasn't enough. Every tribe, nation and tongue would have to universally like his hair and I believed that the Afro was too ethnocentric to create the universal affect that would be needed to keep everyone interested. So it was over. Just like that. Two weeks of 'Dawntoya and Princely' out the window because of a 'poor' hair choice. I would decide later that our children's names would have struggled because of the complexity of our own and they didn't deserve that.

Okay, so can y'all see how the 'crazy' had begun? When I wasn't aware of the world or its revolving I would wear a mum costume and still believe myself a worthy candidate of my own heart throb crushes, but Princely changes his hair and its one and done. Oh how things had changed...and it would only get worse. But I will tell you about that a little later.

Til Later,