This weekend, I spent some quality soul time with my forever sister, Nova Jean. My first-crush-heartache-listener, my scary-movie-lover, my best-car-jammer, my pick-right-up-where-we-left-off kinda girl. My first, true best girl friend from the halls of Arkadelphia Public Schools. If you ask her, she’ll say that our first encounter was in the sixth grade, when I supposedly outright ignored her in class one day. I, however, don’t have any recollection of that happening, and I believe I have an above average memory.
For me, it was eighth grade when Nova became my set-in-stone gal. We had first period English together, where we founded the “Vow Club,” a club based off of the new movie at the time: “The Vow” with Rachel McAdams and Channing Tatum. I honestly cannot remember the premise of the club…I just remember planning an intense sleepover with way too many girls for my socially-uncomfortable self to enjoy. When I think back on it, I have vague memories of us girls sitting around, all wearing our matching Walmart engagement rings for whatever reason, vowing to inform each other of our past lives if we were to ever lose our memory tragically.
It was in eighth grade that Nova became my go-to. We were the cliché meet-at-your-locker between every class best friends. It was the year she introduced me to my first scary movie, as I sat in the theater with a quilt over my head. It was the year we both had super embarrassing and unrealistic crushes, fueling each other on in our obsessive crazy. The year of Magic Springs field trips and frog dissections, recess by the dumpster (!!bitter still!!), eating lunch on both sides of the table because we were so #rebel, and buying each other Slush Puppies. And never forget–when we realized fake Instagrams were a thing.
This past Friday, when Nova suggested we go to see a movie called Eighth Grade, I said heck yes without thinking. I’d never heard of it, but why wouldn’t I go see a movie about eighth grade with the best friend I’d ever had from the eighth grade???
And now, a couple days after walking out of that theater, it is on my heart to talk about it.
That movie is one of the most accurate, heartbreaking, and moving stories I have ever learned in my life. The story is about a timid eighth grade girl named Kayla. She lacks the courage she desires more than anything, as the movie follows her video blogs that paint a picture of the person she wishes she was: strong, brave, and unapologetically herself. From the beginning of Eighth Grade, we watch as Kayla fights anxiety, fights toxic social media habits, fights her young and terrible classmates’ easy bullying, and fights the reality of the everyday, just plain sad situations our youth go through at such a young age.
Nova and I sat and laughed at the truth of silly situations, such as the breathtaking fear that is swim parties at the houses of those girls you aren’t really friends with. When they all are in bikinis, and you’re busting at the seams of your TYR one-piece. (Or…in my case, my Speedo, high neck, zip-up-the-back one-piece.) Or middle school superlatives and incredibly immature comments at pep rallies. Or that heart-beating-out-of-your-chest moment you see the dreamy, eighth grade boy, that now looking back, wasn’t that nice at all. Not in the slightest.
But we also sat, gripping each other’s arms and holding our breaths, as we watched sweet Kayla try so hard to interact with a high school senior, try to act calm when somebody finally asked her to hang out for the first time. Or when Kayla woke up early in the morning to fix her hair and put on makeup, just to go get back in bed, pull her covers up, take a picture of herself to post, captioning it as if she woke up like that. Or when she felt pressured into the world of sex, questioning whether or not to objectify herself just for the sake of having a boy show her attention. Kayla described her life as those anxiety-ridden moments before climbing onto a rollercoaster…except she never experiences the relief after the ride, no matter how hard she tries.
And I sat, blinking back tears, as Kayla asked her single dad to help her burn her sixth-grade memory box. They sat in the dark, watching the box of her “hopes and dreams” burn in the fire her dad built. She turned to him and asked, “Dad, do I make you sad?”
He was taken aback, asking her why in the world she would think such a thing. “Because one day, if I have a daughter who turns out like me, it’ll make me sad to be her mom.” And then Kayla climbed into her dad’s lap, and he held her.
I! Have! Never! Watched! A! Movie! That! Made! Me! Feel! Emotions! Like! This! Did!
I don’t know what the purpose of me sharing this on the blog is. I just know that this movie is a testimony to so, so many girls and boys. So many Kaylas in this world today, hurting and just needing love and somebody to realize those things! While my life was not like exactly like Kayla’s, my life, like almost every single other girl’s, has been laced with crushing anxiety and comparison and terrifying heartache. I remember those hard eighth grade moments, struggling for words to say, struggling with how I looked, struggling to see myself in the same light as the girls who already had boyfriends and knew how to wear makeup. All silly stuff now, but then…it was all we knew! And to be completely honest…sometimes I think my generation is living in a constant state of those eighth grade dramas. Eighth grade lasted far past the halls of junior high.
Here’s my final word–we’ve got to be more kind. We have got to notice more! And we have got to realize that there is no need to literally grow up on social media. It’s the root of so much pain. There is so much bad in this world, and we’ve got to start adding a little old-fashioned good.
Go see the movie. XOXO! A!
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