By Anonymous

It was the first few weeks of kindergarten and we were in a large classroom with long bright lights. The brick walls were painted white and there was a huge whiteboard in the center of the classroom. I had no friends and I stayed quiet most of class. Every time I talked to someone I would stutter up and start mumbling. This mumbling and stuttering was the effect of me being scared of people, more specifically, scared of people not accepting me or me not fitting in with the other kids. It was extra prominent when I spoke to adults or to my teacher. Adults seemed so menacing and scary, so I especially tried avoiding conversation with them. I’m not sure exactly why I was always so nervous about that stuff because everyone else probably also felt this way. None of us had much experience in going to school. We’d been to preschool, but kindergarten is the start of elementary school, where there are much higher expectations than preschool.

All this nervousness that I had when I was around people changed the day I met Igor and Frank. It was a rainy day and we were having recess inside, and because we were inside I decided to sit at my desk and draw. Drawing was something I did to avoid attention because it didn’t require me to interact with anybody and it was fun to me. As I was drawing, Frank came up to me and mentioned that we had the same shoes, a pair of Vans with a shark design on them. Frank was shorter than me at the time, he had short black hair, and often wore long sleeve t-shirts. When he came up to me, he introduced himself and asked me my name. I muttered my name, and then he mentioned my drawing. It was a drawing of a building. He said he liked it and that he also liked to draw buildings. Then he invited me to go hang out with him and his friend. He walked me over to where they were hanging out, and they had two chairs grouped around a desk. Papers were spread everywhere and they were drawing all sorts of stuff. Frank introduced me to his friend Igor.

Igor was also shorter than me, his brownish-orange hair was slightly longer than mine or Frank’s, and he had lots of freckles. He often wore t-shirts with pictures or quotes from movies. He introduced himself and asked if I wanted to draw with them, and I nodded my head and sat down.

Over the next few months the three of us became much better friends. We would always group around that desk and draw whenever we had the chance. We would talk about movies we liked and what we did over the weekend, and we would draw anything and everything we could think of. One of my best memories was this one time when we got this giant piece of paper and tried to draw a map of what we thought the world looked like. Being friends with them changed the way I thought about people. I used to be so scared or nervous to talk to people but after Igor and Frank welcomed me so eagerly, I was no longer so afraid of people. Meeting Igor and Frank didn’t stop me from being shy around other people, but I was now much less nervous about it. 

Another time I had a similar experience was when I moved from my previous school to Seven Hills. Going to a new school came with a whole new environment, with new people and higher expectations. Everything about going to a new school was different and I was nervous to step outside of my boundaries, so during breaks and lunch I mostly kept to myself. But keeping to myself wasn’t fun and it felt like I didn’t belong, even though everyone was trying to welcome me. I decided that at Seven Hills, instead of keeping to myself, I would do what Igor and Frank did for me. I would put myself out there, taking a step away from isolation. Doing this was surprisingly easy because everyone at Seven Hills welcomed me without hesitation. In the end, being friends with Igor and Frank and learning from them has taught me to be myself and all that still helps me in many situations to this day.