Photo by Etty Fidele on Unsplash
The year was 2012. It was senior year and the only experience I had with black men was a one-week relationship with my friend’s ex and an ex-boyfriend that is gay now.
Aside from all that, my experience included making out with a guy at a movie theater and even stranger pecks on the lips with the above-mentioned boyfriend who broke up with me in his apartment parking lot, a mile down the street from my house. I drove home in tears and spent the entire night with him on the phone trying to rationalize his decision. It all makes sense now. I was not his type if you know what I mean.
My mom always said, “They want you. They are just intimidated by your grace…” or something like that. My grace was cool and all but my hormones wanted attention. A guy that would respect me, love me, and want to give me the world. All at 17-years old. You know, a fairytale love story.
*side note: I realize now fairytales do not exist. Love is hard work.
These were formative years. Years of feeling unwanted led to college years I should probably regret but at the end of the day taught me a whole lot more about myself than I was willing to admit in high school.
The thing about my high school is we had a very small population of black students. Black men were slim pickings and they always seemed to end up with girls with a skin tone I could never achieve. No other races seemed interested in me so I felt undesired not only by black men but everything with a swinging appendage. No one wanted to live happily ever after with me.
So as I have been so eloquently putting, high school destroyed how I viewed myself. But looking back I took away these lessons.
Don’t Base Your Self-Confidence in Men
Seeing a majority of black guys with white girls really destroyed what little confidence I had built up until that point. It wasn’t anyone’s fault per se cause, hey, ya girl is down for the swirl. But at that point in my life, I felt like I had all this admiration for black men that wasn’t being reciprocated. In a world that elevates lighter skin, seeing the black men I’d grown to love, seemingly uninterested in what I could offer was disheartening. I thought it was going to be like that forever.
As a good, Christian girl, I was very aware that my worth was in Jesus Christ. But something about hormones and feeling like you’re missing out on something everyone else in the world has experienced (whether or not that was true) made me feel less than. Like, I was behind one step. That couldn’t have been further from the truth.
Basically, I learned to be confident like Olivia Benson. She always kicks butt.
Control What You Can Control
The thing is that you can’t control what other people want. I will say that high school boys defiantly taught me to let go of what I wanted from other people and just focus on what I could realistically control.
High School Doesn’t Represent the World
Hey young black girls, if you’re reading this, please know those lame-ass boys in your high school are not representative of what the world has to offer. The world is a big place full of more interesting people that will want to get to know you and will appreciate you, satin bonnet and all.
Don’t Settle
I’d like to say I learned this lesson and applied it after high school but to be honest it took me a while. But that’s another story for another time. Of the few experiences I had with guys in high school, looking back they were really just me settling for a guy that was interested in me at that time. If I’d truly analyzed the situations, I’d probably have avoided those situations altogether. But it’s like teenage hormones come with a set of blinders.
Yes, high school did a number on me but I am grateful for those years because, without them, I doubt I’d be sitting here writing this. You see, I wouldn’t have experienced the terrible college relationships that made me so appreciative of Trevor when I met and eventually married him. If I hadn’t met Trevor, I probably wouldn’t have moved to Houston and met blogger besties that enhanced my creative thoughts and encouraged me to write what I was truly passionate about.
Therefore, high school sucks but enjoy it cause more than likely, in 10 years you’ll be sitting in an office working a job to pay bills and wishing you could go back to a time of no responsibility when all you worried about was boys.
If I could go back in time, I’d tell myself that an unbroken heart is a beautiful thing. Don’t worry about boys because they truly are not offering much at that age anyway. I would tell myself to focus more on my education, diet (ya girl is struggling rn), and creating lasting friendships. Adults were right. We literally have our entire lives for romantic relationships. I love my husband but being together is like a full-time job. Nobody needs that pressure in high school. No offense to the high school sweethearts. I envy ya’ll lmao.
And this is not a post bashing black men. I love a black man but maybe more of a realization of how their lack of attention affected me, specifically in high school.
If you like this post, let me know and I will follow up with a post about what I learned from black men in college. That one would be uhhh…fun to say the least.