Back in the Day Thursday

I am twelve. My body hasn’t yet accustomed to the inches it grew over the past summer, so I look all knees and elbows and awkward. I’m in junior high now, and I am so excited. But I quickly realize that the world is no longer pocket-sized, and no one here lets you have recess.

I don’t know what’s happened to me. All I know is that I’m different, inherently, somehow, and it hurts and is uncomfortable and I feel sad.

I don’t have many friends, either. My two best-friends in elementary school quickly joined the "cool crowd," (wait weren’t we the “cool crowd” in elementary school?) and I seem to have been left behind. The few friends I have left are scheduled for “early lunch,” while I, unfortunately, manage to land “late lunch” with all the 9th graders – who have no idea who I am, and absolutely, unequivocally, DO.NOT.CARE. (about me)

I’m pretty lonely.

And then I decide to try out for the basketball team. Why not, right? I grew up playing sports. Brett and I played basketball all the time outside in the yard. He always beat me, every time, but for a girl, I was pretty good. Yeah. Heck yeah!

I’m scared to try out for the team, but I decide to go for it anyway. How exciting to belong somewhere; to be a part of a team! I want so desperately to be good at something, and I don’t want to be alone anymore.

Tryouts last four days, and each day, more and more girls are eliminated. I’m making the cuts, and I’m so excited. “I’m good! I can do something!” And I can feel that I’m so much better than many of the other girls who try out. I’m more coordinated than the others; I can dribble without looking like an idiot and I can make a few baskets – which is definitely a few more than others – I know that for sure.

I’m trying out with my old best friend from elementary school, and I’m happy we’re re-connecting. I hope I hope I want I need need her to be my friend – anyone to be my friend. I’m happy, for those few days; sure I was going to make the team.

The night before the final cuts were posted, I am so excited and nervous and I can hardly sleep or eat. The next morning I fumble nervously with my hair and clothes, I just want to get to school to see my name on that paper, my name, along with others, that means I belong to something, and that I’m good at something.

I walk to the gym. Oh good. I’m the only one there. I want to be alone for this. I quickly scan the names…Brie, Brie, Brie…where’s my name? I don’t see it. It’s a mistake, I know it, I scanned the list too fast, let’s try again:

No, no, no that’s not me, let’s move on, no, no, no, not me…

I’m not on the list. I didn’t make the team.

And then I see it. My name!

But instead of looking like this:
BRIE BROWN

It looks like this
Brie Brown

The coach had crossed me off the list. She'd had the audacity (and the cruelty) to somehow let me see it. To see that I’d almost made it. Almost, almost, almost...

I lean my head against that team roster, and I cry. I don’t belong. I'm never good enough.
Almost. But not quite.

I wander away, make it in a daze through my classes, sit alone at lunch. My ex-best-friend-almost-best-friend-again-but-not-quite had made it. Of course. I knew she would, because she was her, and I was me. Never good enough.

I come home, lock myself in my room, close my curtains, and fall asleep. And for a long, long time, I did just that, every day.

And I still do.

But I’m trying to participate in this world, rather than sleep it away.
I belong now. And I’m not alone.
And I’m okay.

[The next year, by the way, I made the team. Starting Varsity.]