So tonight I was sitting on the computer pretending to get some work done, when the reality was I was surfing YouTube and going through random photo albums on Facebook, when I decided that I was hungry. I couldn’t be bothered changing out of my pyjamas so I decided that I would take the risk and go to Chicken Treat in them anyway. I mean really, no one I know lives near us so the chances of running into someone I know were slim to none. Turns out those chances were more in my favour than I had imagined.

I strolled into Chicken Treat, to complement the outfit I decided to go sans shoes, and before you ask why I didn’t just go through drive-through, well I managed to break my electric windows in my car to the point that they now no longer wind down. Anyway, behind me I heard the door slam which made both myself and the guy in front of me in line spin around in astonishment and wouldn’t you know it, that guy knew who I was.

I haven’t seen this guy since highschool. He wasn’t even in my year but the year above. I still can’t figure out his name while it took him ten seconds to remember mine.

Did he just have a better memory than me?

Have I not changed since highschool and he had? He was at least 20kg heavier than when I last saw him.

Maybe I was just a little weird in highschool and have managed to etch myself onto other students memories?

Whatever it was it was weird. What made it even weirder was that all day I had been trying to figure out why I had won the role of Hodel in “Fiddler on the Roof”. I had received a phone call earlier in the day informing me of the decision and had been pondering all day why they had chosen me. After all Hodel is supposed to be seventeen and I was sure I was too old for the part. Maybe the fact that this boy who knew me when I was seventeen could still recognise me while I had no idea who he was, was a signal that maybe I don’t look at myself in the same light as others.

I put myself down a lot and don’t expect much. I look for reasons why I can’t do things rather than why I can.

On Friday I was working at the school’s athletics carnival doing time-keeping. What surprised me while doing this rather bland job was the fact that out of all the students at this highschool, the sixteen year old version of me could have outrun all but one student in the 400m, yet when I was sixteen I thought I was fairly average at athletics.

It has been a slow realisation this week that maybe I am actually a lot better at things than I give myself credit for. I’m not going to suddenly change and start swaning around voicing the wonders of my endless talents but I am going to give myself a little more credit for the talents that I do have. After all, it is too late for sixteen year old Emma to realise she is a good runner and give it more, but it is not too late for twenty-six year old Emma to start training for the goals she has now.

Image of ME running in the Staff relay team at the Athletics Carnival!  Go Rice House!!!