**Disclaimer: in my mind, this was a narrative on the ridiculous trends I've gone through... but somewhere along the way it turned into an autobiography. Please forgive my self-indulgence.
When I moved to my current hometown, I was eleven years old. The painful awkwardness of being an "early bloomer"coupled with the loss of my fourteen-year-old made my transition to middle school almost unbearable. Desperate for the approval of my classmates, I mimicked the cool kids' styles... which inevitably meant stuffing myself into ill-fitting Limited Too outfits (not appropriate post-training-bra). Gradually, I relaxed and my classmates caught up with me. I sailed through the rest of middle school on the heels of every trend: butterfly clips, capri pants, and anything with a Hollister emblem embroidered on it.
Right when I felt like I was finally a "somebody" in the Class of 2006, we moved to high school. Clinging to my popularity, I pressed on. I lived for cheerleading and tirelessly worked to know the business of all. As a ninth grader, I was living large as Queen Bee. Or so I thought. My then-boyfriend, King Bee, and I broke up... and when you follow up a break-up with King Bee by talking to a guy from a rival high school, King Bee keeps the friends in the "divorce." So there I was: out of favor with the "in crowd." Soon I was dating a boy from the "in crowd" of the grade ahead of me. I'd had a crush on Clayton since 7th grade, so once again I found myself sitting pretty. Lauren had firmly secured her place as my best friend, and, together with Clay's best friend, we were good to go (still dressed in Gap and Hollister from head-to-toe, don't worry). It was around this time in my life when I realized what an effort life had become. I worked very hard to earn my seat at the lunch table with the "cool kids," but every lunch period was a chore. I never knew what to say, and my stories and jokes didn't seem to jive (I think I was a little more sarcastic/cynical than most 16-year-olds). So once again, I found myself in need of doing just that... finding myself, finding myself sans "image."
So I ditched the cool kids. I dropped my name-brand wardrobe in favor of hooded sweatshirts and t-shirts found at thrift stores, I didn't try out for cheerleading, and I took up with a crowd that played ultimate frisbee on the weekends instead of going to the high school football game. We wore lots of threaded bracelets and invested in Chacos. I started listening to jam bands and camping at Spence's farm. I wasn't voted class favorite that year, but for the moment I was happy and myself. My wanna-be-hippie friends appreciated my humor, and nothing they did had anything to do with being cool. But my friends those years were two years older than me, and so of course they graduated and moved on. So there I was... again.
My senior year was easily the most dramatic of my high school career: devastating break-up, full schedule of AP classes, majority of friends off at college, and my own college decision (go with Lauren, don't go with Lauren is basically what it boiled down to). I was in need of a serious reinvention of self. I dyed my hair more times than I count, and for a day or two I looked like a model for Hot Topic. When the goth hipster look didn't work out for me, I threw myself into planning my college career: an SEC college experience complete with sorority life.
My freshman year of college I flipped back and forth between hippie and sorority chic. When I first met Trey, my best friend in Auburn, I was wearing a t-shirt, flowy cotton skirt, and Chacos, and we talked about my senior trip to Bonnaroo. The next night I was in my Polo and pearls with my sweet sorority sisters, trying to line up a date to the football game Saturday with a Fiji or a Farmhouse. And that's how it went for a long time... who I was with defined who I was that day. People often labeled me 'eclectic,' but really I was just unsure.
Somewhere around the end of my sophomore year, I morphed into what I think of as bohemian chic. Really, the trends of flowing maternity-type shirts masked my freshman fifteen...er, thirty. But I happily embraced that style for a while, until I was a sorority recruitment counselor and many of my "campers" told me I wasn't the sorority "type." Maybe I just don't like being told what I am and am not, but that didn't sit well with me. So I went back to beach blonde highlights and tried the sorority style for another season.
Fast forward to now, and I am just as inconsistent in my style as I ever have been. I recently got a "break-up haircut" so my usual blonde, shoulder-length hair is now a brunette bob that will inevitably end up blonde again for summer. Some days I feel like wearing a graphic tee, skinny jeans, and Chuck Taylors... other days call for Jackie O chic... and some days I find myself back in my favorite hooded sweatshirt from the ultimate frisbee era of high school. The difference is this: at twenty-two years old, I am no longer finding myself. For years, I was the victim of my own desire to be liked, to be "in." I was a different person from one day to the next depending on who I was with, not who I was.
At twenty-two years old, finally, I am safe and secure in just being Lindsey. I have incredible friends that I could gush about for days. I know that I want to be a school counselor, and I now have enough experience in the school system to know that it's a field I can be truly happy about... not just a back-up plan. My family fills my life with laughter everyday. My walk with God is growing and maturing before my eyes daily. And I'm kind of liking this whole single thing... kind of. :) My identity is not in who I am with; my identity is in Christ Jesus, and I'm pretty content with that.
God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. 2 Corinthians 5:21
So there. It's not about becoming Lindsey anymore. At long last, I am at a point in my life where I am fully ready and willing to focus on my purpose in life: becoming the righteousness of God through Christ.
No comments:
Post a Comment