I am so incredibly glad that none of you who read this blog – save for one person – knew me when I was little. If you did… You’d be shocked at the change.
Last night, I stayed over at my friend Poppy’s house – it wasn’t planned, because I was at the party of a family friend who I really dislike which was hosted at Poppy’s and I fell asleep. This morning, whilst feeling absolutely gross because I had no change of clothes and no toothbrush, Poppy started talking about how I was when I was a kid.
Oh, God. Because Poppy’s known me for all of her life (she’s one year younger than me), she remembers some pretty horrendous stuff. Put it this way, I wouldn’t be associated with my younger self if I could help it.
Sadly, I can’t, so what I try and do is point out how truly fucked up I was, JUST to make it clear to you that I have changed, I am a completely different person… Or I bloody hope I am.
Even though I WILL regret doing this, I’m going to share with you a list of shit that I did, or how I acted, when I was… Below the age of 10. After that, I got more bearable, though I only started acting in the way I act now a year and a half ago. As in, being kind to people, trying not to argue, helping people etc.
Oh dear what am I doing? This is HORRIFIC!
1. When I was in year 3, so when I was 7, my friend Ivy offended me somehow. I was a violent child back then, so I shoved her, but I couldn’t see the stinging nettles that she then fell into. I’m SO sorry about that!
2. There’s a video of 8-year-old me singing Miracles, up on youtube, in Poppy and Rose’s bathroom. I sounded like a fly and it was the worst thing I’ve ever heard.
3. Up to when I was 5, when I got pissed off, I dived into the doorway between the kitchen and living room (there isn’t an actual door there). I then proceeded to kick my legs and shriek, and when people ignored me, I cried insanely. I mean I was 5 when that stopped – even if my sister says it was later, but that’s bullshit.
4. All throughout my childhood, I used to go to Poppy and Rose’s, pretty much every weekend. I slept over, and woke up at 6 o’clock in the bloody morning. Most often, I woke Poppy up in the process, and we played this game where we created an imaginary world. I was hyperactive and completely weird, so I acted as the characters in that world OH GOD THIS IS MORTIFYING. Turns out that Poppy was just pretending to be playing, and she was actually trying to sleep because 6-year-old Elm WOULD NOT leave her alone. I even pissed off their mother on several occasions by going downstairs, or talking too loudly. Aaaahhh!!
5. This is the worst one by far. Quick family history: my mum comes from a country in Asia, and our extremely distant relatives were part of a tribe (I don’t know how to spell the name). So… I must have been 8 at this point, or 9, and I decided to try and act as if I was part of it because I thought it was cool or it made me interesting?! Now I think on it, it was kind of racist… WOW. I spoke in this screwed up language that I made up, and tried to… CURSE Poppy and Rose’s brother, or even those two when I got pissed off with them. I sat on the stairs and mumbled in this strange language and when Poppy brought it up this morning, I started yelling “OHMYGOD stop we do not talk about that ever!” because I’m sorry, but what kind of kid pretends that they are part of a tribe which they know nothing about?
6. When I was 6, so when I was in year 2, this girl who I didn’t really like fell over. At that time, I was kind of neutral towards her because she didn’t treat me like I was stupid yet, but when she fell over I laughed. I LAUGHED. Yes, I think it was because I didn’t know what else to do, but still! I feel so bad now.
7. Until I was 9, I had no real technology: no computer, no phone, no Nintendo or whatever, so I used to listen to CDs. I sat in my little chair in the kitchen (which we still have) and listened to stories, which is most likely why I went into secondary school with a horrifyingly pretentious vocabulary. The embarrassing part is that I used to sometimes listen to it when my FRIENDS were round, which is so antisocial and I feel very bad for them now.
8. I had a friend in primary school called Harrison. We always used to hold hands, because that’s how people guided me when I was 8. We were walking down to Church (because our school was a Church of England school, says the Atheist) and one of the teaching assistants says, “Elm, should you really be holding Harrison’s hand? People might think you were boyfriend and girlfriend!” I screamed so loudly that people probably stared at me, dropped his hand and TRIED to run away. And failed.
9. In year 6, I took it upon myself to think that I fancied all the boys. I had a crush every week, except it wasn’t because I was 10. One day, our teachers sat us down in a circle and said they needed to talk about something. That something was “fancying”, and how we were a bit too young to be thinking about that. Narcissistically, I thought they were talking about me so I got terrified. Obviously they weren’t, but still; I was under the impression that I had crushes on all of these guys. Awww!
I think I’ve gone so red that I look like a traffic light. I actually can’t believe I did all that stuff.
I think I’m going to sob in a corner. There are more stories, but I can’t think of them off the top of my head.
Do you have any really weird things you did as a child? Please tell me I’m not alone!
From Elm 🙂