Driveway Boys

9/14/24

Today I was out walking, and I was coming up to four boys in a driveway, ages roughly 8-12. My first thought was to turn and walk the other way.

I’m a 41 year old woman about to change course to avoid a bunch of neighborhood boys riding electric scooters, eating freeze pops, and listening to Katy Perry.

I was afraid of them.

Not of being physically hurt, but I didn’t want to hear what they had to say about my body.

You’re fat.

You’re gross.

You’re ugly.

Or simply Eeew.

Variations of things I heard when I was young that boys felt like they could say to me.

I didn’t turn. And you know what they said to me?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. One of them was singing, “California Girls,” and the others were begging him to stop. 

Maybe this new generation of boys is a little kinder than the one I came from. Or maybe they had enough sense not to snicker at an adult (sometimes I forget I’m not five or eleven or fifteen anymore). Either way it was a reminder that past hurts still run deep, and I haven’t fully dismantled the fortress I’ve built around myself to protect me from them.

Staying the course today felt like breaking one of the bricks.