Me circa 1988 or so . . .So I wasn't the loudest of chicks back in high school. Circa 1991 - 1997 I was awkward, shy and uninteresting. Or so I believed anyway. I left school and never looked back. I didn't particularly believe the circle of friends I hung out with were that interested in keeping in touch anyway and when they didn't bother to contact me, I decided I was right and moved on with my life.
Of course, nowadays social network sites mean the past can come back to say hello. I started talking to people I knew in school online. Look at me and F - that's how we got started with our gargantuan Facebook chat session that lead to a date or nine. And I also talked to some of the girls I'd been friends with in high school.
I realise now that friendship is a two way street. I didn't really give these girls a chance to get to know me properly, too afraid of boring them . . . I assumed when we all headed our separate ways and never heard from them again that this was THEIR fault. But the blame lay with me too. When I spoke to the girl that was formerly one of my best friends, I realised this. I didn't make an effort with them either.
She's invited me to her 30th this weekend and I said I'd go. I'm going with another girl from school I haven't saw for years.
Some of the girls there will be part of my old circle of friends. The ones I was so shy and awkward around, so not the person I feel I am now.
I am worried I may regress back to that person.
Me circa now . . .I know that people who know me nowadays laugh when I say I'm shy, when I try to describe how painfully so this was when I was a child. Just because I can laugh off an embarrassing moment these days, or come out with a rude one-liner, does not mean this has gone away. And anyway, with the people who have been in my life in the past ten or so years, I have been ABLE to reinvent myself, without pre-conceptions.
The only person FROM my high school life I have met for at least ten years is F. Okay, so that went well (at least at the time) but that was a bit different. I never felt boring around him when I was younger. I could TALK to him, even if it was about the shallowest, most light-hearted of things.
Even with the blogger meet-up in Manchester, worried I might give out a completely different personality or vibe to the one I put across here, I was not so nervous.
I'm kinda brickin' it, if I'm brutally honest. I feel like I'm about to go on a date . . . with my entire high school year. Even though as far as I'm aware there will only actually be a few people from high school there.
So I've assembled some armour. First, the
pretty pretty shoes. Which will probably make me fall over.
Let's face it, I tend to fall easily. (The Manchester Tweet-up girls will be nodding in agreement here if they're reading!)
And then there's the dress. (Apologies, it wasn't on the website, and my photo has it in front of two other dresses and a coat, so it isn't the best of impressions of it. But you'll get the vague idea, I hope.)

Which is brand new from Warehouse. Which means probably at least one other person will have it. And remember how I get panicky at the idea that I may turn up in the same outfit as someone else. That being said, I look pretty in it. Which would help the confidence issue.
I then need to spend several hours fixing my hair, face and trying to cover any stray mozzie bites, and tell myself how awesome I am repeatedly, while reminding myself not to say anything EXCEPTIONALLY stupid in lieu of an awkward silence. (Since anything stupid I say will result in FURTHER awkward silence, undoubtedly . . .)
So what do I need from you guys? What is the point of this post?
I think I really just need you to talk me up, tell me how awesome I am.
Every girl needs to fish for compliments once in a while, right???