Whose idea was it
– please enlighten me –
back in the eighties
to instal changing rooms in clothes shops
with no privacy?
Mirrors were no friend of mine at home
let alone when in the company of svelte girls.
Harsh-lit under lighting
guaranteed to magnify my cellulite
and glint on the mouthful of metal
glued to my teeth by a dentist with no pity for
teenage sensitivity.
I was encircled by girls –
with perfect hair
with perfect bodies
with perfect teeth
with perfect make up.
Whose idea was it, I ask you?
It was the school changing rooms all over again
and the dash through the communal showers
as fast as I could without slipping over on those
god-awful brown and yellow tiles.
I still hate shopping for clothes –
thighs too robust to fit in jeans
knees too chunky for on-the-knee skirts
biceps too muscly for long sleeved shirts.
I like my hair though.
It’s too wild and woolly for fashion these days.
But about that one thing, I don’t care.
Over at Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Magaly is hosting and asks us to write about one of three bees – the Queen Bee, the bee that works the hardest or the bee that doesn’t fit in. Of course I chose the latter. I don’t feel that I’ve ever fitted in anywhere really (although the writing and art community seems to be suiting me rather well these days!). That not fitting in thing was certainly a theme of my growing up…
Please head on over to The Garden, have a good read and if you feel inspired, join in!
Freya Writes... 
Sometimes I wonder how the odd ones like us survived being teens… it was different for boys but I could feel the not fitting in so well…
I sometimes wonder that myself.
I like this, Freya. It reminds me of how I sometimes feel, just a little hippie left in me, the feeling at least. That was towards the end, towards the beginning here I was thinking of the men’s restrooms, a lot don’t even have partitions.
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Thank you for peeking in on my post and for leaving your nice comment. This is the first time I have visited you, you have a nice blog.
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You’re very welcome Jim, and thank you in return 🙂
Thank you, Jim. Oh – men’s restrooms with no partitions?! Hmm… I can imagine that’s not easy…
I love this poem—especially the closing lines.
Thank you!
My grandma used to say, “Nature makes them, and they get together.” I wonder if that’s how so many writers (who also happen to not fit in) end up in the garden. We fit with each other. That’s such a great thing. And yes, there is the nice hair, too. 🙂
It could well be true – grandmas tend to be very wise 😉
I went through the same about a decade before. We had to take gym and pass! I even failed at showers as I ran, like you, as fast as possible through the perfect bodies of my gym mates. I always seemed to slip on something.
You really called back that feeling — which I still have today. There is a discount designer store in another town with no curtains/doors. Now, it’s the mirrors! I have one at home — on the medicine cabinet door.
It’s hard to handle, isn’t it? And that kind of feeling stays with you, all those decades later…
It takes a long time to get comfortable inside one’s own skin when everyone focuses on the perfect. Well-said and definitely know the feeling.
It does, doesn’t it? I’m not quite there yet, not all the time. Thank you.
I went to a really small school so when your wings didn’t glitter with the same pattern everyone knew it. I have always been the odd in “normal.” Great piece!
Thank you!
Oh I suspect you were in fine company back then ~ so many young ladies having insecurities, even the seemingly perfect specimens! Nice write.
Yes, I doubt I was alone! Thank you…