A Piece of Me

I never been the type of person who doesn't befriend a person because someone else says not to. Actually the more I'm told about someone who has been "out casted" from the larger group, the more it makes me want to get to know that person for myself. This has been the case with me since I can remember. Actually a great deal of my best friends are those folks who were "out casted". They were labeled weird, nerds, crazy, two-faced, and more. I want to say I befriended these people because it's the right thing to do, that's not entirely true though. This is where my story begins....

It started in the summer before eighth grade, dad got laid off from work. My mom sat my siblings and my myself down and expressed the financial situation our family would be facing until dad could find work again. My sisters and I sat and listened to mom and I remember thinking anything I could do to help I would. That night my sisters and I decided not to make so many messes and to keep our room clean. My older sister broke open her piggy bank and gave my parents all the money she had saved up from baby sitting and my younger sister and I pulled together our little change and we offered it to our parents. I will never forget the look on their faces. They told us to keep our money and that everything was going to be fine we just wouldn't be receiving as many luxuries as we used to.
Everything was okay at first, then school started. Normally we would go shopping for back to school and get entire new wardrobes to match the current fashion. This year we could only get the clearance items which were no longer fashionable. I don't think my sister's and I cared much we were excited to be getting new clothes. This particular year Jordan's were the popular shoe. They started at one hundred dollars a pair. The baby girl was to young to care. I remember asking my older sister after the first day of school did she feel out of place cause she didn't have any Jordan's. She replied it was awful not only did she not have Jordan's but there was this new game kids were playing where they were going around checking the tags on people's clothing to see if it was name brand or not. Of course her clothes were not.
The next day I was a victim of the tag checking game. My friends at the time teased me and others in our group who tags didn't display a designer's name. Our friend group was split in half. I was so upset, but I didn't want to tell my parents because I knew this would make them feel bad. The teasing went on for about a month then this game sort of faded away, though its effects didn't.
I was no longer in the "popular" group, which composed of people I had been friends with since kindergarten. I was left to hang with the people who my old group of friends teased sometimes relentlessly. I was left in such a horrifying situation I've never felt so alone. I'm forever grateful for this experience because it taught me so much.
People are so much more than what meets the eye. If you judge someones worth based on other's opinion, physical appearance, or even your first impression you will miss out on the opportunity to really get to know someone.