Speaking of elementary, I have come to realize how much of a loser I actually was in elementary school. We were discussing that whole experience at freshman dinner and when I was telling them what I was like and watching everyone laugh hysterically, I realized. I was a nerd and I didn’t even know it-which is good- that means I’m a cool nerd, right? So here’s a little overview of Beth.
My parents let me dress myself when I started kindergarden (pronounced kin-duh-garden because I couldn’t say my Rs). So, I was normally decked out in the mickey mouse shirt with the purple flowered pants, red socks, and my corrective shoes. Complete with retainer and usually a headband that I didn’t know how to wear correctly, my outfit properly complimented my fat little body. Later in life, we added some giant glasses that went halfway down my face because of the BIFOCALS. In the fifth grade, my favorite outfit was purple boxers with neon flowers, a green shirt to match the flowers, green socks, and (drumroll please) brown sandals. It was hott, I’m not gonna lie.
I hated PE but I was world renowned for my jump roping skills. I anxiously awaited the JumpRope for Heart thing that would come every year. It was my time to shine. Other than that, physical activity was pretty much torture. My kickball team would put me in the outfield and then I would jam my fingers when I tried to catch the ball. During the presidential fitness test, Mrs. Hagelstein would line the class up and sit them on the sidewalk and then call your name to walk the Walk of Shame. Then I would stand on the chair and grab the pull up bar and she would take the chair out from under me and I would just hang until I fell off, like a bag of ham or something. I seem to remember some pretty traumatic experiences with dogeball as well…..
School pictures were the worst. My fifth grade year, we were invited to bring our most prized possession,which for me was a stuffed duck ( a teddy duck, if you will). During the class picture, they made us leave our things on a table and some other kids were over there so in the picture, I’m not looking at the camera but at my duck off stage.
I was pretty nice to everyone. The only time I remember being truly hateful was after a stressful kickball game. This mean kid, John Brown, was making fun of me so I called him a slave. Yep, that’s right. He’s white too. A slave. (I’ve pretty much decided that I did that because we had just finished studying John Brown the abolitionist and I was just mixing that whole group together). Yep, had to sign THE BOOK, which was a fate worse than death. I cried. Another time, I got reprimanded because I told my teacher I had to go to the “john”. She said that wasn’t lady like but I never really understood that because I learned that phrase from my grandmother.
Oh, Nanny. One time I was sitting on the ALPS bus waiting for other kids to get on (Chyng and I had probably just finished having our rock war with William- it was a weekly occurence), and I turned to look out the window and my grandmother is running toward me holding my sack lunch in the air like a torch. That wasn’t the worst part. She had a turban on. and a broom stick skirt. She appeared to be a lunch carrying, running, gypsy. She got on the bus and handed me my lunch. I was hecka embarassed then but man oh man is it a funny memory now.
Yeah, so that’s me in a nutshell. When I wasn’t at school, I was at home listening to a tape my cousin had made me, something about SPAM. Emily U. and I had a library of babysitter’s club books (almost every one- even the special editions). Sometimes, I’m tempted to break out the old stirrup pants and the painted cat shirt, but Elizabeth always stops me.
Tell me what you were like in elementary. Let the little porky four eyes have a chance to rear it’s cute head again.
welderbeth 
Nothing makes me happier then listening to little kid Beth stories (they’re just so dang funny!). Anyway, what I, the picture of AWESOMENESS, was like in elementary. Lets just say- it’s a wonder I had friends. I loved to read and thus spent all my time alone, on the beanbags, reading. I wore a sweatshirt everyday (whether it was cold or not). I wouldn’t allow my mother to do my hair so I did it mysylf (this task is still difficult to do to this day so you can imagine how I handled it in my younger years.) During P.E. I wasn’t all that great- but boy did I try! Those are always the kids you feel the most sorry for, you know, the ones that actually believe they are good at something. I still remember one day in 4th grade my mom dropped me off roughly 40 seconds before the bell rang, and I was always late so I wasn’t allowed to be anymore, so I ran across the field to get to my room and when I made it- the boy who I, and the rest of the 4th grade, was in love with quoted “Wow, you’re pretty fast.” He ruined me. Since then on till about.. umm 8th grade- I thought I was a speedy runner. Annddd.. my last comment, we had dress up days (which I ACTIVELY participated in): I was dressed to the nines. China day, I was in full kimono and my hair was in those little sticks and complete makeup, 50’s day- I even had little pointy glasses, Australia day- I had a parrot glued to the shoulder of my Steve Erwin outfit. I thought these outrageous outfits made me cool at the time- but as I look back on it, I’m not sure if we were even supposed to dress up. Oh Lord.
you make me snort…..really you do. I think we wont talk about my coolness in elementary, it might tramitize you.
first of all, i thought those neon shorts and socks with the brown sandals were hott to the max. if you were a nerd, i was a nerd, because i remember us spending all of our time together in fourth and fifth and sixth grade, playing games in our backyards, coming up with three million clubs in the clubhouse/shed behind my house, playing dress up and having tea parties, and my glasses were just as big as yours. not to mention, i had the gap in my front two teeth, boy hair, and an awkwardly wirey little body for my head. i remember mom not letting me wear shorts that were more than a credit card above my knee, and so i would roll them up at school, and oh yeah, with every outfit you had to wear the socks pulled half way up your calves… i remember us wondering why brice hagelstein adjusted himself in front of everyone in gym during dodgeball, flying kites with you in the field beside our neighborhood and getting them caught in the stupid mesquite trees, singing “don’t go chasing waterfalls” in your living room, and once, when i was feeding my fourth grade teacher’s RATS with my true love at the time, ian atchinson, i got bit. i remember thinking you were the coolest thing on the block because you read the stinky cheese man, and you had the best laugh and smile… i remember being way way overly hyper active, and you just smiled and played with me, and i remember you introducing me to my very first country song… “way down yonder in the chattahootchie…” i don’t think we were the nerdy ones, i think we were the ones who lived life to the fullest.
Honestly…It’s late, I’m up doing homework, so I didn’t read the entry at all due to its length…But I felt obliged to comment just because I visited the site…Have a good day!
Let’s just say I kept the Kleenex company in business when I was little because I got my feelings hurt way too easily (not a good thing for the dorky redhead with the freckles). I still get my feelings hurt way too easily, but I try really hard not to cry in front of other people. For instance, last Sunday I was at church with my friend Zack, and I was crying because I had gotten into a bad fight with my dad just that morning. In order to conceal my tears, I lowered my head like I was praying (which I actually was, by the way) and did my best to discreetly make sure my mascara wasn’t running (not out of vanity, but because I didn’t want Zack to know that I had been crying). But back to childhood….
My stepmother made sure my hair was always permed from first grade through fourth grade because it was easier for her to fix every morning that way. She wouldn’t let me fix my own hair because I always did it wrong. I think she noticed that my hair had thinned out considerably from perming it all the time, so by the time I started fifth grade I had straight hair. Unfortunately, that was about the same time that my hair decided to be curly all on its own.
I was in love with Justin May in elementary school until fifth grade when I began going to a different school. All he and I ever talked about was dinasaurs (his obsession) and Lois and Clark: the Adventures of Superman (because it was super cool, still is in my opinon). I heard from my best (and only) friend in fourth grade that he liked me back, but I was too shy to ask him for myself because I had previously told him in very creative ways of my eternal devotion….repeatedly. I had been rejected every time, but he always blushed before insulting me.
Then in fifth grade I went to a different school because we moved to a different house. I quickly went from having two best friends to have no friends. I’m pretty sure I was the biggest dork anyone had ever seen, and I remember one girl in particular was especially hateful to me. A few girls were nice to me, all of the boys were mean to me, and I made one friend. We were always fighting about one thing or another, but she was the only friend I really had.
Then middle school, oh dear…worse than fifth grade I think. The boys were even meaner, the girls were all so pretty, and I had begun to learn what a zit was. Undaunted, I immediately fell in love with any boy who talked to me, and cried about them at home. I’d rather forget the whole ordeal, in fact.
High school was slightly better because many of the people who were quite mean to me in middle and elementary school decided that maybe I wasn’t that bad after all. I made a few friends, got close to them, but eventually, even that ended. And now the people I consider my best friends were people I never went to school with anyway. Maybe I was just always in the wrong place…..
But hey, at least now I’m cool, right…..