Today I honed in on my trigger word:
nerd.
I said something silly today to a coworker and she walked out of my office, laughing. Then she threw a word over her shoulder, "Nerd."
My smile drooped. I felt sad and well, nerdy.
I probably wouldn't have even stopped to think about it, except the same thing happened to me a couple months back on Facebook! An old friend from elementary school wrote on my wall, "You're still a nerd."
OK, yes, she wrote it in response to my claim that if Jane Austen were alive today, she'd totally be my BFF. I suppose that may have been asking for it, but it still made me feel kind of bad and like I was the last one picked for teams at kickball or something (which I always was, by the way).
In school, the number one word I was called was "nerd." I heard it at least once every single day circa fifth to ninth grade. Sometimes it was me who was using the word. But it's still a label. Other labels that flew around in the air on a regular basis were: fat, stupid, ugly, slut. Plus many others. You may remember them. By all accounts, the word "nerd" isn't so bad at all. It just so happens it's the one that was directed at me and the one I maybe even labeled myself. Weird.
After thinking through these awkward leftover middle school feelings, I decided to just own it. Be a nerd! Take the word back. Now I just need to get
this shirt to complete my moving forward process.