My Non-Awkward Adolescence

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Hey Readers!

 There have been many points where I have looked back on my previous three and a half years of being a teenager, and kind of feel like I have wasted these years. I mean in reality, I pretty terrible teenager.

 Adolescence is supposed to be awkward; mine just isn’t. Yes, I admit that I am a very awkward person, with a few amusing stories, such as the arm wobbling on a train, the rest I am not brave enough to put on the internet. But I mean in reality, that’s about four stories, all of which have happened in the last seven months. Other than that, I have never had a boyfriend, never got drunk, only ever had one argument with my parents (which wasn’t even over a proper teenage issue) and haven’t even ever had a detention. It’s a year and half until I turn eighteen, and I’ve never had to go to a frickin’ detention (and out of pride I don’t plan to).

 As I sat out in my garden today enjoying the sun I mulled over this thought and I have come to three conclusions, which I shall discuss in this post.

 

Because we will all have a nice collection of Polaroids [Source]

Firstly, are we supposed to find it awkward when we’re going through it? Does every teenage have this guilt when they realise they haven’t done the ‘teenage bucket list’ and suddenly you begin to question what on earth you have been doing with your time. Does the supposed awkwardness only become apparent when you sit there reminiscing with old friends about what you did, and then awkwardness becomes apparent? Only at 32 can I truly see that my friend dropping a blanket (anyone there will know what I’m talking about) was a truly awkwardly adolescent moment? Even still, I don’t really feel I have had many Inbetweeners moments.

 At the same time I’ve often justified it to myself by saying I’ve never really had the opportunity. Going to a girls’ school and being a proud social hermit means that I don’t really know any guys, and those that I do, I don’t really fancy, and they understandably don’t really see me as the most desirable human being currently roaming this county. I have chosen to be teetotal (not that I would be drinking underage anyway *cough*), which is probably a small factor contributing to why I have never been drunk (amusingly I was actually pressured by my Mum to drink some Pimms* the other weekend, one of the weirder experiences of my life). Then as to arguing with my parents and never having a detention, I don’t see the joy in deliberately agrivating someone and thus making life hard for everyone else, plus you miss out on so many long term gains (clothes shopping, convincing teachers that you really have just forgotten your homework**). So it’s not exactly as if the opportunity to be an awkard adolescent came to my thirteenth birthday party, but then I sent him away because he wasn’t invited to my future. The reality is I’m just a bit of a boring person.

Source

 Finally I have still got two years at school. And for the first time since primary school (I was very much an “ew boys” kind of girl) I’m going to be entering a mixed environment. Oh dear Lord no. I’m actually going to have to deal with those things with the penis things. And if it is anything like the taster days it will be very very awkward, because the boys and girls have such different reactions to the opposite gender invading their space. Us girls tend to get very excited at the sight of someone possessing a Y chromosome, and we all try to leap on them and claim them as ours. However we encounter a problem: we sort of… Terrify the boys? I mean the boys would stick together and not let any of us double X people in. They would stand so closely packed together it was physically impossible for us to infiltrate. On top of that, no matter where we were, this natural gender divide took place and it was firmly penis' on one side, vaginas on the other. I was rather amusing to observe, even more amusing for those  who had been to mixed secondary schools to watch just how socially inept we all were.

 Every now and then I find myself in the position of longing for the teenage hood that I’m currently living. I’m sitting here writing an angsty teenage post and claiming that I’m not a ‘proper teenager’. I think it might be finally time to accept and realise the adolescence is nothing like it is portrayed as in 90s teenage films and on the Disney channel. However I have my own kind of adolescence,  one which has become centered around education and the relationships I have with my friends. And with my current plans I can see awkward times ahoy, but maybe for the moment I should just celebrate the lack of events that will stop me being employed in the future.

Gwendolen

*I actually had to check how to spell Pimms. That’s how clueless I am when it comes to alcohol related products.

** This was 1) a huge lie- I honestly couldn’t be bothered to do it, however I had been such a good child in the past, she decided to trust me. MWUAHAHAHAHA. And 2) goes back to the motto which my father parted unto me of “Thou shall not be caught”