Fifth Grade Awkwardness

Fifth grade was, on the whole, an awkward mess for me. I had spent half the year in fourth grade, then because of my age, was moved to fifth grade for the second half of the school year. Not only did I have to adjust to the curriculum, but I had to make new friends in the middle of the year. Thankfully, I did make friends, and some really good ones.

So at some point in the fifth grade, there was an incident where I felt like I was wronged by my teacher. We had just come in from the playground. It was close to the end of the year, so it was warm outside, and yeah, I was probably a little sweaty. Upon sitting back down in the classroom, our teacher suggested I take off the short-sleeved button down shirt I was wearing on top of a fitted tanktop.

Excuse me?

Mind you, even though this was fifth grade, I was one of those girls who had tits blossomed developed early. As if puberty wasn't bad enough, I was going through it alone; it was a small private school, and none of the other girls in our class were even considering training bras at that point. When the teacher told me to take my top shirt off, I knew I didn't want to. "No, it's OK," I muttered meekly. I wanted it to go away. I did not want to bring attention to it.

Then she began to INSIST that I take off my shirt.  Loud and often enough that by that time, everyone in the class was basically following the argument. I wanted to crawl and hide somewhere; I had no desire to put my curves on display for the entire class, especially to the boys who I thought were cute. Eventually, I gave in and took off the shirt, and spent the rest of the day in silence and avoiding all eye contact. I was so embarrassed; I already felt awkward about my body, and bringing attention to it like that made me feel 100 times worse.

I didn't know and still do not understand today why that teacher did what she did. Maybe she was concerned that I was too hot and needed to cool off. Maybe she was a sick pedophile that got a kick out of pubescent girls. Maybe she hated me for some reason and wanted to embarrass me in front the boys I was crushing on. Who the f*ck knows. Once in a while the topic comes up while talking with a very dear friend of mine who was in that class. "Remember when Mrs. X told you to take your shirt off in class?" she'll ask, with a hint of bewilderment still in her eyes. And to this day, more than 25 years later, I still cringe at the thought.