I'm a Hot Piece!

Here I am at my 8th grade graduation. I am 13. My lips are covering my incredibly buck teeth which I will not get braces for for another 2 years.

And yesterday, I was at a photoshoot where the photographer shot me implied-nude style, covered in a white dropcloth with a come hither look, my lips slightly parted, wet.

Clearly, I never anticipated being the type of girl men would want to see in such a position.

And I don't really know how the hot girls do it, because I am at such a loss, navigating the tricky male friendships I try to maintain. And I think the problem lies within me not having grown up hot. For instance, I developed a wickedly funny sense of humor with a penchant for puns and sarcasm. Growing up and flirting with boys was easy, as they weren't intimidated by my beauty because I didn't have any. It's like I tricked them because all of a sudden, these boys who were laughing along with me, appreciating me because I wasn't like all the other girls (read: pretty girls they were attracted to) liked me back. In fact, at 16, while listening to "Les Miserables: The Original Cast" musical tape, cause I was a huge NERD, I loved the lyric "the pretty girls who went to our heads/the witty girls who went to our beds" because I was a witty girl! I wasn't having sex then, but I knew that I would be! Because I was funny.

But now I'm funny and kinda hot.

So I'm flirting with these boys, sometimes a little too aggressively, because I still have my 8th grade graduation self image. Even though I'm kinda hot now, I forget it, and still work too hard for it. It being, um, validation? Love? oy. who knows.

In fact, the other night, while hanging out with a friend I haven't seen in about a year, we had some fun times covering what happened in the last 12 months, but once it got late and I finally had to go home, I said "what's wrong?" And he told me he was nervous. "Cause you're hotter than you've ever been." he said.

No I'm not! I'm still the girl above in the floral patterned dress.

And I feel like I ruined another really great friendship because of the same thing. That there was an initial attraction and I worked hard to trick this guy into liking me, forgetting that he probably already was attracted to me and I didn't have to DO anything to make him like me except be myself.

And I realize that I'm basically saying, "Wah! Wah! I'm kinda hot now, POOR ME!" but I don't know how to behave as this girl. And I'm ruining friendships because of that. And that's why I'm bummed. I make friends, like friends, try to trick them into liking me back and fail. Almost epically. I make these quick intense friendships and then feel abandoned when they get all "whoa, what is WITH this chick?" and back off.

And I have abandonment issues, so....

I need to be myself, but just toggle me down a switch or two. Stop trying so hard. Yeah. I need to stop trying so hard.