The strange kid would walk around town with his parents, reading the numbers of license plates as they went by. As he does not posses a superhuman memory (and rather, there is nothing quite superhuman about him), he does not remember it for himself. His relatives all seem amused whenever they recall this story, or remind him that his favorite books used to be encyclopedias, or other non-fiction works. Only in retrospect did he realize he has never asked any of his elders how they felt about it. He imagined they were proud, or at least, happy to see his parents’ affinity to numbers continuing another generation. Indeed it did: his favorite road-trip games were puzzling riddles and learning arithmetic tricks.
Later in his childhood, he was sent to a gifted class for his fourth grade studies. While he generally quite enjoyed it (long morning drives aside), he left after a year, due to his inability to handle a weird social situation that occurred. In retrospect, he could see it as foreshadowing many other parts of his adolescence, and in the great ‘what-if’ game of life, who knows where he would have been had he stayed there. Then again, he was in fourth grade. What kind of emotional maturity could be expected of him?
The weird pre-teen found his home in video-games and sports, more than anything else. While the latter were fun, and he enjoyed the activity and competition, he immersed himself within the former. He could easily tell you far more about companions such as Heroes, Crash Bandicoot, or Diablo, than he would be able to recall about many of his friends. While he certainly had some of those, they diminished in both quality and quantity as he moved from elementary school to the purgatory that is middle school. Of relationships, or any precursor thereof, there is little to talk about. Unfortunately, he was closer to his books and consoles than to any girls.
The eccentric teenager and his family moved halfway across the world. Perhaps the most telling sign of his social ineptitude was that only in retrospect did he realize how difficult the move was; at the time, he was blissfully unaware. During his freshman year he found himself with a circle of friends, and somehow drifted apart from them within less than a year. His Friday nights were spent having dinner with his family, and perhaps another family of friends, and afterwards retiring to play video games or watch a movie. He was not troubled or upset by it; for the most part, he simply did not know there are alternatives.
Romantically, things were not any better. While he met and briefly dated an interesting and exciting girl during his first year abroad, he let her get away over a silly incident that spiraled out of control. The future was not brighter. As he lacked friends and was inexperienced with emotions, he never quite knew what to do with them. Some signs of affection scared him away; to others he clinged mercilessly, blowing anything and everything out of proportion. It took him the better part of high school to gain some semblance of confidence (and a very limited one at that, as he still had issues with taking off his shirt at the pool), but it was all too little, too late, and even when things materialized, he barely got to experience them. A member of his freshman year circle of friends admitted to having a crush on him, for a long while. Never in a million years would our shining beacon of social competence have guessed it.
The peculiar adolescent did not have a better way with friends, either. He always felt somewhat of an outsider, second-rate to any other friends of his few friends. He was not an easy person to like. Loud, arrogant, and not incredibly kind, his actions tended to alienate himself, rather than bring people closer. He involved himself in many activities, taking positions of leadership in one or two, but always feeling a little bit outside. His video-game habit was ever stronger, and during his few years of high school, he spent an absurd amount of time playing World of Warcraft. It was absurd enough to suck away time from other activities (not to mention his schoolwork), yet not enough to truly master it.
Similarly, he probed many sports, enjoying each of them, but never immersing himself enough to reach any notable achievementד. He lacked single-minded focus and dedication, powers he would only acquire a few years later, when medical circumstances left him no choice in the matter. While he eventually landed on a peculiar sport one he grew to enjoy immensely, even there he did not do all he could to better himself in to,
in retrospect
much to his chagrin. Similarly, only during his final year abroad did he finally make some new friends he felt comfortable with. As always, his timing was impeccable, as soon afterwards they all graduated high school, and he returned to his country of origin.
The strange kid, the weird pre-teen, the eccentric teenager, and the peculiar adolescent will always be a part of me. However, no longer are they who I am, or rather, I am no longer any of them. Things got even worse before they got better; but better they did get, and while the 2015 model is far from perfect, he is much improved, or at least, vastly different. The details of journey here, which I would have never been able to make alone, will come soon. While change has to start from within, there is no way I would have been able to grow and evolve as I have without the help of some very dear people.
This post was inspired by Arcade Fire and by one of my favorite questions in OkCupid: “Would you rather be normal or weird?”
