Ill-Fitting

Were you popular in school?

I, most decidedly, was not ever popular.

Throughout all of junior high and much of high school, I tended to hover around the fringes of the different kids - not really getting to know many people very well. And the ones I did know - most of them - were, like me, outcasts - we pretended it was by choice.

At some point, I thought I stopped caring about fitting in. I certainly pretended not to care that the party invitations didn't come or that I didn't have the "right" clothes or the "right" hair or the "right" address. I began to do things my own way. This typically entailed Easter egg colored hair dye, piercings (before even the cheerleaders had them), and Salvation Army label clothes.

I suspect what I was really trying to do was give them a reason to ostracize me rather than wonder why I was ostracized. At least, if my hair was pink (or fire engine red, or blue), I thought I knew.

As an adult, I've never really tried much to fit in. I go to work, I come home. I don't tend to socialize with my co-workers (although there are a few with whom I most certainly would...if they asked). I go out with friends - friends whose primary groups I hover around the fringes...303, Shelter, among others. I blog...for me and for the few people who read me. But, as a rule, I don't really try to fit in anywhere.

So I don't know why it bothers me so much to look at the pictures Schmutzie posted on her blog from a blogger conference held in Nashville last weekend I didn't know about or to read entries on Uncle Typewriter and Geekin' Hard and Letters From a Small State's blogs about a silly little blog meme going around whereby bloggers get "awarded" a special "Stylish Blog" award by other bloggers.

But all of a sudden, I feel like I'm 13 again, without friends, smiling shyly, wishing people would like me. Wondering why they don't.

I look at Schmutzie's pictures of all these bloggers and I think to myself, "They all look so put together and I am so not all put together. They're all women with a purpose and I can't even manage to accessorize appropriately."

And I can't even find a niche being subversive because A) I'm not subversive and B) it's already being done. 

But then I have to remind myself...while I blog, I'm not a blogger. I'm not exactly one of them. I blog about Nothing. Like Seinfeld without a Thursday night line up. Real but not normal. At least, that's what Lex says.

I'm just...me..."Just Jane"...in my infinite wisdom. A place where I dump all the thoughts I have that don't fit in anywhere else. I guess I shouldn't expect then to fit in with anyone else.

Still...sometimes I do think it would be nice to fit in. Somewhere.