This morning, I carefully laid out my clothes for the day in a neat little stack at the foot of my bed. I quickly showered and breezed through the rest of my morning rituals, nearly blinding myself with a toothbrush, but I hardly noticed. For the first time in my life, the very first, I was actually excited to go to school. I resolved to my self yesterday that I wouldn’t be a loser anymore. Or a dork. Or a nerd. Or a priss, or what ever else I was called on a daily basis. Last night I finally made the decision to go shopping for the clothes I needed to be cooler. I bought basically every item of clothing I had ever seen any of the popular kids wearing; hats, shoes, watches, pants, jeans, anything that seemed like it would help me fit in, I bought. It seemed that with every item I swiped the credit card for, my insecurities would shrink. I wasn’t going to be a nobody anymore. I was going to be popular.

I glanced up at the clock as I struggled to lace up the new basket ball shoes that I found on my feet. It was 7:50. Time to go. I walked out the door, but couldn’t help sneaking a look back, suddenly overcome with a desire to crawl back under the covers and hide there for the rest of my life. I shrugged the feeling off; it was no use going back now. I had already committed to it, I was just a little nervous. I smiled reassuringly to myself as I gazed out the window, counting the trees as they seemed to walk by. I thought about all the things that would change now, the people I would talk to and the friends I would make, the parties I would get invited to. It was like every door in the world had opened up for me.

The sudden stopping of the car interrupted my flow of happy thoughts. I was there, and it was time to show off the new me. I slowly unbuckled my seat belt and then brought down the mirror on the roof. Perfect hair, perfect teeth, perfect everything. I was ready. I started walking up the grey stone steps, my messenger bag swinging and hitting the back of my knee with every step I took, as if it were urging me on. I couldn’t wait to push open the door and be popular already! I took a deep breath, threw open the heavy double doors and… nothing. No one noticed. The day went on like any other, like it always did. No new friends suddenly materialized, no one was begging to drag me to a party, people didn’t stare at me in awe as I walked down the hall. I ate lunch with the same people, still got called a doofus walking down the hall, was still awkward and still turned fire truck red when the cute French girl in front of me would say my name. Nothing was different.


I felt like breaking down, crying, giving up. I had the clothes, the shoes, the perfect hair and even the right color shoe laces. Why couldn’t I just be like every body else? I thought about it for a while, and then it came to me. In that moment of utter devastation, I realized anyone could start dressing differently and say they’ve changed. They might even believe it too, but it would never be a real change. The only thing that would change is you start blaming everything on the clothes you wear, always falling back on a cotton and denim crutch, never realizing that maybe you’re just shy or trying to make friends with the wrong people.

After realizing that, everything fell in to place for me. I started making friends, joining clubs, playing sports, started volunteering. None of those things started happening to me because of the clothes I wore. They started happening because I stopped caring about the brands every one else was wearing and started caring about what they were saying and thinking. That was the real change, the one that really mattered, and it made all the difference in the world.