rebel girl.

preschool:

- my deviant behavior began at a tender age. there was this girl who had really nice, silky, smooth light brown pigtail braids who sat in front of me every day. i had very frizzy, dark brown, unruly pigtail braids. i did not like her braids. okay, i was jealous of her braids. and she was just so smug. okay so one day, i couldn't take it anymore, and i grabbed my scissors (those little plastic jobs with the strips of dull metal in them and the huge handles) and i reached out and cut off the bottom part of her braid, the part that extended past the rubber band. boy, did i catch hell... but i can't say it didn't feel amazing.

- one day on the like slide-apparatus (one of those contraptions where you climb up into a fort type thing and there were different ropes and slides from which to descend, and a shaky wooden bridge connecting two sides) i was being especially hyper and excited. as i was about to go down a slide, i turned, laughing, mouth open, and ran smack into a smaller girl. unfortunately, my little front teeth went right into her forehead (yes, i was a giant even in preschool) and she had two little teeth marks in her forehead. well, my teacher yanked me from the slide, and proceeded to bascially call me a dog, and ask if she needed to put me on a leash, since i liked to bite people. even at the time, i knew she was being a little ridiculous, and perhaps even abusive, because it was clearly an accident. no one would ever try to bite someone's forehead. if i had really wanted to bite her, i would have grabbed her arm and chewed. whatever.

fourth grade:

- my mom had been a girl scout leader at my school for a couple of years, so i thought i was kind of the bomb. this particular school year, she did the wise thing and chose not to waste her time w/g. scouts. i continued to do it, because my parents wanted me to have something to do after school. the new troop leader did not care for me. this was the beginning of my chatty phase (which has lasted about sixteen years) and i would not shut up in troop meetings. finally, one day about two weeks into the new season (or whatever you call it), the troop leader kept be after the meeting and asked me not to return. basically, i got kicked out of girl scouts. she said i was too loud and she could not control me or something. i went home and told my parents "you know, i'm over girl scouts. can i take art classes?" dodged a bullet there.

eighth grade:

- i was always a sucker for a cute boy, and, being the nerd that i was, i quickly and thoughtlessly would hand over my notes and homework to any boy who asked for them in junior high. well, in junior high, the boy was some puerto rican wannabe tagger named peter. he was a classic delinquent, but extremely gorgeous. i was the best history student in our grade, and he knew i drooled over him, so he asked me for my history notes and homework, and i gladly handed them over. i don't quite know how he found out, but my history teacher, mr. bishop, approached me a couple of days later and yelled at me for giving "that loser" (his words) my shit. he threatened to turn me in to the principal, give me a lower grade on the next test, etc. i still don't know how he found out - i think the kid did miraculously better on a quiz or something and mr. bishop grilled him about it or something.

...needless to say, i did win the history award again, second year in a row. i was really nervous about not getting it after that debacle. good grief. i was such a nerd.

high school:

- my junior year, i became really, really restless and rebellious. (well... as rebellious as you can get at an all-girls catholic prep school). in my ap us history class, i had a love/hate relationship with my teacher, ms. littleton. she was an admitted bipolar manic depressive, but she usually loved me. however, during the semester, i started becoming a little too chatty. and she would scold me for it in front of everyone. and then, when anyone talked, even three rows away, i would get blamed for it. i began talking back to her, being a real bitch and insinuating she was crazy. then, one day, i had it. the bell rang for lunch, but she was still talking. i had already packed up my shit, so i just got up and started walking out. i don't like people wasting my time. BOY was that the wrong mofo thing to do. sounds relatively harmless, but my school was proper as hell. she kept me after class, yelled at me, called me disrepestful and offering to throw me out of class, blah blah blah. a couple of weeks later, on my report card, her comments in the *optional* comment section were "reckless, even disruptive" and i got a "needs improvement" in attitude. nice.


i guess i never really recaptured the glory of chopping off some girl's hair in preschool. nothing could ever really top that. i was basically a nerd who talked a lot and developed major attitude problems in high school. what's not to love.