|
Grade 7 - bunny nose, beeping, and now mouth opening and blinking. Yeah, I know; everyone has to blink and open their mouth. Not everyone has to blink 40-50 times a minute, and not everyone has to open their mouth so wide they could fit their fist in it, just to maintain the status quo. I was well settled in my "School Freak" role by now, and kids can be so goddamn cruel. If my folks were worried about me not having any friends when I was in grade 3, they should have seen me now. I managed to keep one good friend, Shane, all the way from preschool. When the hormone thing started happening, I developed a huge crush on him which remains unrequited to this day. He was the one person who never judged me, laughed at me or made me cry (except when he said he didn't want to be my girlfriend!).The "cool" boys would ask me out, knowing I'd say yes, only to say, "Hahaha, yeah, right! Like I'd go out with a fatty boomsticks loser like you!". I cried a lot in those days. I started playing the euphonium in the school band, then the local youth orchestra and brass band, and eventually signed up for private lessons. It seemed the only time I didn't tic was when I was singing or playing. Soon, even that was affected when I ticced in bars of rests or when I had to take a breath. Nobody noticed really, mainly due to my prized back-row position. My music allowed me to be passionate and loud without offending anyone or looking like a total space cadet. High school arrived, I ticced and the world revolved as usual. I had a close group of female friends and a couple of very good male friends, but I supressed my tics as much as I could around all of them. The boys were macho cool guys, and the girls were beautiful and popular - I felt inferior the whole time I was around them, but it was worth it coz I finally had friends that stuck around. Band and choir were a huge part of my life now and I had a few fleeting romances with music geeks that I thought were lovely. Life started to be something I enjoyed. Then the tics got worse. << >> |