thirty days of thirty years: fifteen

Year fifteen, 1996-1997, was my freshman year at Oak Park High School. I turned fourteen in September. 

I was on the cross country team, basically because my brother told me to do it. He was a really good runner and so when I showed up everybody had high expectations. I went to this Freshman orientation before school started and met this girl named Sara, who would later be come a friend. She knew my brother from the team and so she asked, "Do you have your brother's running genes?" The question confused me a bit because I knew that no authentic runner ever ran in jeans, so I replied, "Um, no, but he did give me some t-shirts." Unfortunately, I turned out to be a pretty bad runner but I really liked the sport, mostly because of the people. 

The cross country coach's wife, Mindy, was a Young Life leader. I also went to Young Life because my brother told me to, and some of my friends from the cross country team also liked to go. Young Life was just a couple years old at Oak Park so there would be some weeks when about 20 people went, and other weeks when it was me and three of my friends. 

Freshman year was the only year I played soccer for Oak Park. I loved the sport but several of the girls on the team gave me a pretty hard time. I remember one day at practice a couple girls teased me and said, "Breitenstein talks like she's writing an essay." Even though I laugh about that now, such a random insult, that day I cried.

The summer after freshman year, I got on a bus with some other students and we made our way to Young Life camp in Buena Vista, Colorado. It was love at first sight and Frontier Ranch is still my favorite place in the world.

When I got on the bus with a long night ahead of us, I sat in what I thought would be a pretty desirable seat. I was still a quiet girl and so I needed to position myself in a place where I was not so likely to feel left out. Pretty quickly, a girl I was kind of friends with asked if she could sit next to me. I say kind of because she always seemed like a fair-weather friend, to me. I agreed and was frankly happy that the seat next to me was not the last one taken. It didn't take long, however, before she was asking to switch seats with me, so she could sit in the aisle. At first I said no but she kept pressing the issue and tried to make the window seat seem really great, even though I knew better. Window seats are great on airplanes but when you are in a chartered bus full of your peers, hyped up on Twizzlers and anticipation for what is said to be the best week of your life, the aisle is where you want to be. Eventually, I caved in and switched seats with her.

That is a really sad moment for me to think back on. I didn't recognize it at the time, but I was deeply insecure and for me to switch seats with that girl meant that I believed a lie. The reason I switched with her was not because I wanted her to shut up about it, it was because I didn't believe that I deserved to sit there. I felt in my heart that I was a window-seat kind of girl, the kind who should sit quietly and look out the window while friendships and conversations happened in the aisle. I actually cried quietly for a minute as the bus pulled away in the dark, looking out that window and mourning my self-esteem.

Mindy was a leader in my cabin that week. I had gotten to know her from cross country meets and Young Life club, and I always admired her. She and another girl from the team and I went running on the mountain once or twice that week during free time and because I was a terrible runner they had to circle back for me a couple times, while I wheezed away. And once I happened to mention that I liked a particular wild flower and the next day I found a fresh blossom laying on my bed, with a little note from Mindy. I couldn't understand why at the time, but she pursued me and gave me an aisle-seat kind of dignity.