Small Town Girl

The day, the month – I don’t remember; and perhaps that’s for the best. The year and my age I remember too well. I was sixteen. Young, ‘fresh’, and ‘innocent’ by Western society’s standards. I played the role of classic small-town girl so well that I didn’t even know I had the part, but I wasn’t even that stereotypical small-town girl that wore short skirts or a lot of makeup and thought she was everything. Yes, I loved fashion, international fashion magazines, and beauty; however, I applied these things to myself with an amateur touch that you don’t see now. There was no fake hair, fake tan, fake eyelashes, fake nails. I’d only had my braces off for about a year (which I’d had since I was 12); my body had really only just budded into a slender but perky womanhood; and I had only just grown to my full height of 5’ 7”.

I ate well and spent weekends riding to the beach – swimming – with no desire to be glamorous to attract boys. I was simply there for relaxation and fun with my sister and our friends. I had grown into a young woman so quickly that even my peers barely recognised me. I remember a teenage boy that I had previously been in primary school with riding past me with a group of other boys while I was awkwardly standing outside of the local library with a handful of books. He circled around, double-taking and exclaimed how amazing I looked to both me and the other boys; while I was left blushing, embarrassed and wanting to hide. I was actually painfully shy and self-conscious; preferring to immerse myself in books and physical adventure rather than in grown-up endeavours. In public, more often than not, I wore long dresses that silhouetted and lightly accentuated my figure rather than tightly moulded to it. I hadn’t yet discovered high heels. Apart from a single earring in each ear, I had no extra piercings. So different to what I see 16-year-old girls wear now. Times change, but I have the feeling that I might still have been the same if I was 16 years old today, as I was never a follower of my peers at school. In hindsight, my innocence was my trademark and identity, much like my Marilyn Monroe or Cindy Crawford beauty spot was. It was something that I gave away at too low a price given that it was priceless, and at too high a cost to the rest of my life. 

What I did have at 16 though, and I’d had for many years – perhaps to my detriment – was an insatiable curiosity and longing. A coveting for something bigger, more; something greater than my town and my life. I wanted the city; excitement; a greater sense of being; to experience the world. Everything. Although I was an academically strong student at school, I daydreamed so much at times about these things that I remember a teacher once slamming down a metre-long ruler onto my desk because I was gazing out the window instead of paying attention in class. Looking back, both the desire and drive to discover more – neither of which ever dimmed – were the greatest motivators for my future successes and the greatest causes of my downfalls. Only looking back as a truly mature and educated woman could I see how stupid a 16-year old girl could be.