Yeah, he called me that…
It’s late and I’m scrolling mindlessly scrolling through Facebook.
I don’t recognize his face, but his name causes my stomach to tighten. I had not idea those feelings even existed in my body anymore - that anxiousness, that feeling of being trapped, that drive to escape overridden by fear of being alone. The feelings that dictated my life for almost two decades.
Suddenly I’m a 12 year old girl with a boy’s hand on my thigh. Uncomfortable but unsure how to escape the world I have built for myself in the middle school hallways.
In seventh grade, I had a boyfriend. Not everybody did. Obviously, I was special because I belonged to someone. He was kind of a badass. So I was safe. Even better, he liked to give me nicknames. You definitely belong to someone when they give you a nickname.
I don’t remember all he labeled me with, but one lingers all salty and shame-triggering.
Cheap thrills.
You read that right. In seventh grade I had never kissed a boy, I still wrote sweet little notes with the i’s dotted with hearts, and had New Kids on the Block posters on my bedroom walls. But he called me that, and I wore it.
I don’t want to say I proudly wore it, because while I answered to it and signed my notes (still dotted with hearts) CT somewhere deep down it didn’t feel good. Life had taught me that love isn’t safe or sheltering unless you become what someone else wants.
Cheap thrills.
Honestly, I do not know what his life was like (if I did, I have long since forgotten). Now, as an adult, I can imagine his childhood was not healthy either. I can forgive what must have been his own family trauma and dysfunction manifesting in our juvenile relationship.
But, no, Facebook, I don’t want to be friends with him.
He keeps showing up in my feed (and yes I know I can remove the suggestion), but somehow I wanted to come to terms with this…with her…the girl…the girl who accepted cheap versions love and grace. The bright, funny, dreamed-filled girl who allowed the world to cover her in labels so that maybe someone would want to keep her.
If I could walk those hallways now I’d find her…push the greasy bangs out of her eyes, gently lift her chin with my hand, and when those green eyes met mine I’d whisper the truths that she longed to hear. I’d tell her she is loved, she is valuable, and there will be people who see her.
I’d tell her that someday she would come to know the God who created her headstrong, passionate heart (and held it when the world abused her body). I’d tell her of the man who would cherish her, give her a real nickname (Sweets), and protect her with his love. I’d tell her that they are wrong and hurting themselves — the ones who label her, the ones who are unable to see her, the ones who make her feel unlovable. I would tell her that she would learn to love herself.
No, Facebook, I don’t want to be friends with him, but thanks for the walk down a dimly lit hallway filled with gloomy memories.
Cheap thrills.
It goes through me like lightning now. Igniting a righteous indignation. I want to defy it, to prove it’s not right.
But I breathe and know that those words have no power here. The echoes of my past blow across my new life and sometimes threaten to rearrange the warm and bright place of belonging. I have nothing to prove to a boy from my past…to a voice from my past. I just have a little girl to honor in the woman I am.
So today, will you be lovingly defiant with me? Let’s honor the middle school girl who lived unlovable. Choose to radically love the people around you. Help someone feel seen, valued, and loved. Lavishly love the people in your path. Give someone a sweet and loving nickname…and mean it.
