Scattered Memories and The Invisible Girl

 Part 3

No one ever really noticed me in school unless I made myself noticed, and I did that quite a bit much to my own embarrassment later in life. Having a time machine would be great for these sorts of things, but we're not here to talk about those moments just yet. Where here to discuss why I feel I was so invisible.

The first sign I had any special talents came when I was in Kindergarten. We were coloring the coloring pages that had been handed to us. On my page was a little girl with a beautiful little dress on with hair to her shoulders. This little girl to me desperately needed red hair. I can remember thinking why do people call red hair red when it's clearly orange? I looked down at the crayons on my side of the desk comparing the two crayons in question. Yep, red hair was really orange. At least the red hair I had seen anyway. I had noticed previously in the school year that when other kids would color their character's hair red they would all use the red crayon which to me ruined the coloring page altogether. So I picked up my orange crayon and I boldly stood alone seated in my chair coloring my own little girl's hair orange. She looked just like people with red hair usually did that I had seen.

Now that I look back on those years I realize that should have been the first sign that I would be a future artist, but yet how was I supposed to know? I was only a kid, and for years and years after that, I would grieve over my friend John Davids's ability to draw. I would sit at the desk beside him and watch him draw his figures and yearn, and wish that I could draw such things only to find out in high school when I took an art class that I actually could draw.

Another thing that I remember from my childhood that pointed towards me being an artist later in life was my great desire to draw my own comic book strips like the Peanuts Gang. I would spend hours drawing simple shapes, nothing fancy but simple shapes with cute fun names that I would come up with that I wanted to turn into my very own cartoon version of the peanuts gang. I never was able to do that but I remember it well and I still have that desire to this day.

I was always a creative child making my own doll clothes and my own paper dolls, and often drifting off into my own fantasy world with made-up stories floating around in my head. It was better than tv. I could never keep my mind focused on anything redeemed boring to me for more than 5 minutes. Which I guess is why I brought home bad grades in math and biology, and why I got ignored when the academic teams were picked. No one wanted an average child on an academic team. It wasn't until college that I learned I could write short stories and poetry. I even won a few contests and came in second place in the state in the KHEA writers contest. I know if I had kept on entering besides those 2 times I would have eventually won first place, but I didn't. Maybe someday huh?

One thing I have learned in life is that if you really want to do something you will. Below is a picture I drew of myself. It's never too late in life even if you do feel like the invisible girl or guy to discover something about yourself that you never knew you could do.

All through life and growing up I felt like the one struggling to make friends. The one struggling to fit in. The outcast, the forgotten. The invisible one. The shadow is always there but no one notices. Life is hard and the only one who can change the way you see things or react to things is you. I still struggle with all these things but I've learned not to let other people get me down. I've learned to love myself and fall back out of love with myself after a bad relationship, and then pick back up the pieces again after that and start over. No matter what happens in life I will never let them see me sweat, and I will always find some way to survive with God's help of course. I could never do all I've done without God, and some things I've done without God and it was a disaster but we will talk about that at a later date.