Stephanie Streisand

Story Telling Project #1 of more. Title - Clueless

“I remember looking at myself in the mirror in this toddler dress and jeans, with my orangey-brownish skin and thinking to myself, ‘Stephanie, today is the day it’s all going to change!’”

I wasn’t that popular growing up. I was a big loser. I tried soooo hard to fit in, but I never could because I always had a huge knot in the back of my hair, my lips were bigger than my face and during the morning announcements everyday I sang out “The Star Spangled Banner” louder and with more passion than anyone in history.

I remember when Clueless came out in theaters. My mom and I saw it together. I was too young to realize it was making fun of these types of people. I took it at total face value. I left the theater glorifying these characters like some people do after seeing Star Wars for the first time, except the movie was Clueless. I wanted to be them! I wanted to be popular!

The next morning I looked for the perfect outfit that would make me totally popular. I found a dress I wore when I was three-years-old and somehow got into it. It looked like an extremely short baby-tee with ruffles coming out the bottom. But all that was going through my head was, “It was yellow and black, just like Cher’s outfit at the beginning of the movie!”

Then it was time to put on some make up. All I had was one of those cover-up sticks. It was many shades darker than my skin. I drew it on all over my face. And so it wouldn’t be obvious that it was just make-up I also put it all over my neck and hands.

I remember looking at myself in the mirror in this toddler dress and jeans, with my orangey-brownish skin and thinking to myself, “Stephanie, today is the day it’s all going to change!”

When I got on the bus everyone stared at me. I was so confident. I thought to myself, “It’s working! I’m popular!”

When I got into class, my teacher asked me why I was dressed the way I was. I told him, “This is the way I always dress. You just never noticed before.”

At lunch, Joshua Braunstein, the guy I had a crush on, asked me, “Why do you look so different?” I said in a soap opera-like style, “Because I’m popular now!” And he responded, “Oh. Okay.”

It wasn’t until halfway through the day that one of the mean girls that I so wanted to be my friend, broke my false reality and told me that everyone was making fun of me because my skin looked like I put orangey-grease all over it and that they knew my shirt was a tiny dress. I looked around the room. Aside from seeing every kid looking at me with a smirk on their face, I also noticed orangey marks all over the classroom that must have rubbed off my “make-upped” hands throughout the day! It was everywhere; on the big map, text books, desks, papers, doors, walls, Joshua Braunstein’s shirt… I ran to the bathroom and tried to wash the orange off my face, but at that point it wouldn’t come off. It had dried!

I spent the rest of the day hanging out in the bathroom, but I have still never felt more popular than I did the first half of that day at school. I was totally clueless.