THE NARRATIVE ARC
Repeating Kindergarten Shook My Confidence to the Core
Time traveling to sort through uncomfortable emotions
I felt dumb and out of place when I started 1st grade at Monroe. The previous year, my parents decided to have me repeat kindergarten at Middle Earth preschool. They didn’t want me feeling overwhelmed by their finalized divorce and starting at a new school simultaneously.
Too much change, they thought as I thought, What’s the matter with you?! I’m excited for first grade and want to go with my friends and now they think I’m dumb.
I was mad as hell and stuffed it down. I felt humiliated and disappointed. I wanted to go to elementary school with current friends. It was the order of things, and my order was already seriously out of whack with my bouncing from home to home.
When I finally went to Monroe the following year, my friends from Middle Earth were veteran elementary school goers going into 2nd grade.
Grades didn’t socialize with each other, so those friendships were done.
One weekend, I marched with Dad in a gay rights parade. Dad and I were “caught” on TV. On Monday, vocal classmates let me know they’d seen me by jeering and telling me I shouldn’t march for gay rights, slinging…
