We Were Girls

We were girls.
We were girls that could become statistics.
In many ways, we did.
In many ways, we still can’t be defined or described by any number or way to measure ‘people like us.’
We were poor, fatherless girls with parents that couldn’t work hard enough or often enough to pay the bills and keep us out of trouble.
Each of us had a story about alcoholism, abuse, beatings, drugs long before these were part of our own stories.
Each of us had a need for fun, friendship, acceptance, encouragement, time, attention, love.
None of us had a family providing anything like that.
Naturally, we found each other. On a bedroom floor listening to Lite 96’s Pillow Talk at someone’s 15th birthday party, a room full of junior high girls told secrets they hadn’t told anyone else before and cried about the injustice that we’d already seen, the cards we were dealt or the boys that had already hurt us. From that night on, we were girls.
To the music of TLC and Aaliyah we danced, we sang, we roller skated, we did our hair, we met boys, we learned how to smoke cigarettes, how to steal cigarettes, how to sneak out, how to make out, how to get drunk, how to get high, how to give a hand job, how to fight, how to talk shit. We debated and discussed and decided our value systems. We were naïve and cheesy and stupid, but we thought we were so cool and for that moment in time it didn’t matter what anyone else in the world thought just as long as we were girls. We could (and did) talk about absolutely anything. Things that only young girls don’t know and want to know. Does my hair look better up or down? Are these jeans too tight? Is it okay that my boyfriend pushed me? Does it hurt to have sex? How do you get a guy you like to ask you out? Have you ever masterbated? Do you believe in reincarnation? Do you believe in God? The list was endless and we talked about it all. We learned how to be a friend. We learned that nobody has your back quite like your friends. We also learned that nobody can hurt you quite like your friends.
Just like it always does with teenagers, our friendships ended or went separate directions as we each found our way in life. Almost 20 years later, I find us all connected again on Facebook. For the first time in 20 years it feels like we’re in the same room again and I realize that I love these girls. For who they are and for how they changed me and how they made my life worthwhile when everything else sucked!
I can picture the past just like its right in front of me. I remember dancing around Jenny’s house to “What about your friends.” I remember dressing up like TLC for Halloween. I remember Jenny getting in to club Elite because the bouncer liked her ass. I remember eating an entire batch of chocolate chip cookie dough with Nikki. I remember Tara coaching me on keeping my hand relaxed when I smoke. I remember all of us trying to be quiet in Nikki’s kitchen late at night and knocking over every damn bowl and jar in the refrigerator until somebody pissed their pants. I remember Tara getting an 8-ball jacket that she liked so much for at least two weeks she strutted wearing that thing! I remember having a sock wrapped around my bun and having it fall out at the club. I pretended it wasn’t mine. (By the way, who the fuck wraps a sock around their bun? One of you bitches convinced me it was normal. LOL!)
I cannot believe those times were almost 20 years ago and in many ways we probably could have predicted some of what has happened in our life. We have all had babies with men we weren’t married to. We have all had enough failed relationships to be sick of all of them. We have all had to work our asses off to get ahead in life or just to put food on the table at times. What I could not have predicted is just how much our friendships changed me or how much those times would mean to me still at 32 years old. We were just kids, but we were girls.