How to Find Love - Chapter 8 - A Big Bald Mess

Readers, haters, friends, ex-lovers and boys who brought me perfume - welcome back. Not much is new around here, I am still 23 and surprisingly single. This week I’ve written and deleted this intro at least four times. I don’t have any better way to say what needs to be said, for me highschool was one giant mess. Picture whatever mess looks like to you and then times that by a thousand you’re beginning to picture me, in my grey and maroon uniform trying to be everything that everyone wanted. I lived this story, and I know there is no lack of content, but trying to figure out exactly how to tell it is an issue. 

I can still remember the first day of highschool, the smell of the old B block which is no longer, meeting the peer supports that seemed so old and wise at age 17 and immediately half crushing on anyone with a penis. Everyday felt like the day that the world would end. I was constantly mad, confused, in love but the raging hormones and angst of a 13 year old girl should never be underestimated. I was also so ready to make this year mine. 

The first victim of my love came in a set of two. Two brothers, one shaved his legs which was equal parts freaky and intriguing. The other happened to be the third friend in the maillove101 and pizzalove101 group. I tried my best to keep it local. The brother with smooth legs happens to venture back into my life many years later but that’s a story for a much later day. It was June before I also developed feelings for a great human and friend, it just so happened that he was also looking for the man of his dreams.

Year nine was intense for more reasons than just the boys that were flowing in and out of my life. I had started a poetry club, was really involved in the school recycling program and I decided to shave my hair off, all of it. With my attention seeking masked with my selfless cancer awareness escapade I decided to not only go bald, but to go bald in full school assembly. I got the idea where I got all my good ideas at the time, driving over Moonshine bridge. I have zero regrets about what I did, I raised a lot of money, I stood in solidarity. I did a good thing. Good thing aside, there was no way around the fact that I was now bald. 

The regrowth was a testing time, it was two months into the process when I decided to let my sister dye it. The result meant I spent six months looking like a ginger version of 2009 Justin Bieber. I had good friends, good enough to tell me it wasn’t looking great, but still I savoured the moments of knowing that my intentions were honourable. I could survive looking at ginger Justin in the mirror knowing I had done a good thing. My only regret came when I met him. And when I say him, I say the boy that changed my world. 

It was nearing the end of the year. The weather was warming and chaffing was increasingly becoming a bigger issue. I was outside the sports centre drawing my name on the concrete with the remainder of the water in my bottle. He was quick to point out that I was missing the ‘a’ on the end and then seeing my lack of water graciously added it. As it was our first interaction one would usually question how he knew my name. But I didn’t, because I knew his. 

For the first time I had a boy that would text me back, and by my appalling low standards that felt like Christmas. I stayed up late pouring my heart out and listening for any noise of my parents coming down the hall, hearing the noise. I would drop my phone down the side of my bed and try my best to act asleep. I think it worked. Curry (his nickname) told me about his mum dying, his girlfriend also dying and struggling with a heart condition. I lapped all the misery up, and used all of my feelings to try and make him feel better. It all led to me coming up with the cringiest idea yet. I went to the warehouse and brought an A4 book. An empty, blue, ready for my poetry - book. 

I spent the next three weeks filling every page, with poems to cheer him up, spaces for him to write his own, questions that were supposed to lead to healing, pages about me “ten fun facts,” what I like to do in the summer and my favourite singers. Every single page in this 180 page book had something on it. The perfect gift for someone, especially someone I really liked. 

The moment I gave him said book is seared so strongly into my brain and it is unlikely to ever leave. With the book clutched tightly in both my hands I started to approach his group of friends who were all hanging out in the sports centre, one foot in front of the other, I could do this, I could do this. I was about ten more steps away when someone bumped into me, sending the book sliding across the gym floor to the feet of one of my school bullies. She picked it up and read the title page “Curry’s Poetry Book”. Even she was in disbelief of the cringe level in her discovery. I ran towards her begging for it back. He, noticing the commotion and his name, came promptly as well. I managed to snatch the book and spun around ready to run for cover. He called my name, so I spun around once more. A few awkward words were exchanged, and I gave him his book. Everyone watched. He hugged me and everyone was aware that this hug meant a lot more to me, then to him. 

I guess it’s obvious that this story didn’t end in a fairy tale, or else I wouldn’t be here telling you of my need to find love and therefore my lack of it. But this story couldn’t be further from a fairy tale, it was a giant mess. One that will need more than this chapter to explain, one that I still haven’t fully understood. See you next week, 

Unapologetically,

Emma