Boxes. Everyone in high school gets put in one. I hated my box when I was in high school and I fought particularly hard to get out of it (prepare yourself for a little taste of my smug teenage spunk):
I’m Asian and I do not LOVE (nor am I even good at) math. Get over it.
I am not a good violinist because I am Asian. I am good because I practice. For hours at a time. Get over it.
I am Asian and I’m not trying to be valedictorian, be in the top twelve or maintain a straight-A record. Get over it. But I did graduate 18th in my class without even trying. So suck on that.
Oh but I guess that means I’m smart. And smart girls are ugly and NO FUN AT ALL. So I guess I’ll go home, hide my hideous, hideous face and recite MATH PROBLEMS.
Back then, the closed minds saw my race before they saw me. Curiously, it isn’t what they seem to see first anymore (except, I'm sure, for when I’m trying to park my very Asian Toyota). I have a whole new set of stereotypes to fight now, but since this site is about teenage boxes, I won’t go there.
Which box did you fight as a teenager? Or did you even try to fight it at all?
I think it was hard to box a mixed race person like me... Or maybe it was just hard for me to know where I fit in. Asians thought I was more white; Whites thought I was more Asian. Alas.
ReplyDeleteThat said, what I liked about going to a 3000+ student high school (versus a 300 person middle school) was that there wasn't that much pressure to fit in with a certain group, because there were SO many people and SO many groups that no one had time to focus on you. (Obviously that could be bad too, 'cause you could sort of get lost...)
I guess everything has its ups and downs, eh?
LMAO suck on that.
ReplyDeleteI can't even recall a box. I know collectively we were known as the Rogers kids (via middle school although we were dispersed in various groups in high school). Rogers kids were known as smart kids, and funny enough there was just a ten-year reunion for our middle school.
I don't think I ever thought in boxes, I rose-colored glasses assumed we all got along.
Funny, as another half Asian, I felt uncomfortable because I DIDN'T fit into a box like everyone else seemed to in my West Texas high school. I longed to fit in somewhere...anywhere. I grew out of that phase, thank goodness, and now love being different, not quite fitting in anywhere, but fitting in everywhere at the same time.
ReplyDeleteSo wait a minute... I was the only one who felt like everyone was putting me in a box??? What exactly does that say about me? :-) I think it was because I was always like Anna - wanting to be different, to stand out. And how could I stand out in a neatly packed box?
ReplyDeleteBut I do think all of these different perspectives are interesting - especially since fitting in and getting along were mentioned. Me? I actually never really thought about "boxes" as being a way to fit in or get along. I always felt like I fit somewhere, but I still felt that people (even friends) were always compartmentalizing me and everyone else. I feel like it's a way for people to bring order to the world - it comforts them to know that everyone and everything fits somewhere. I like a little disorder I guess.