Seventeen years old feels like seventy when you look back. Kindergarten was decades ago. I woke up on my first day feeling so small.

Shyer than anyone on earth, I walked onto Field Elementary grounds with a list of fears longer than my five year old brain had capacity for. Once I let go of the tight grasp of my mother’s hand, I was about to start a life of my own—My twin sister that I’ve had by my side since my existence was in Mrs. Hefflefinger’s class two whole doors down—and I watched who I thought the only two people that would ever be on my side part in different directions. I was frozen in silence all day, and surrounded by kids my age that I’ve never seen before. Just as my shyness was about to lead me out the door, I saw Ellie.

Ellie was someone who you would call a classic kid. She had dirty blonde hair just like mine, with two short strips of wavy hair hanging down each side of her forehead. Her freckles and her gray-blue eyes popped out against her pasty Irish skin. Ellie’s face glowed with just as much joy as she actually had. She liked watching “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” with her little brother, and “Mary Kate and Ashley” with her three two older sisters. Ellie was even a part of the Indian Princesses troop, where girls our age would camp out, eat junk food and have ‘tribal ceremonies’ with their dads, and always had a hysterical story to tell about her experiences. She was just a classic kid.
Having Ellie by my side made it clear to me that I had nothing to fear anymore. I no longer had just a sister to tell all of my secrets and to play with. Ellie and I loved playing the same games, crushed on the same boys, ate the same snacks, and always painted our nails the same shade of purple. We had almost everything in common, except for two things: Ellie was a soccer player and extremely outgoing, and these qualities were definitely not ones that I had. This wouldn’t affect our friendship until first grade. In First grade, we went from best friends ringing each other’s doorbells every day, to just passing in the hallways waving. If you really think about it, it’s pretty hard to notice so much change happening with a relationship as time goes by. Of course, being a first grader, I had yet to learn that. I wasn’t aware of the amount of relationship changes that would happen in my future.

Second grade through fifth was all the same. It all seemed to work out just perfectly. Each year I’d pick up one new friend to add to the group: First grade it was Sarah, second it was Kylie, then came Hailey, then Jennie, and then Isabelle. It also just so happened now that Michelle and her friends meshed together with mine, and that was the start of a new group of friends.

While middle school was an awkward struggle for others, it was a breeze for my friends and me beginning on the first day of sixth grade. Popularity followed wherever we went; people knew who we were. Even the seventh and eighth graders knew who we were, and of course we spent our weekends doing what all the cool kids did—we would hang out uptown Park Ridge and get Starbucks and chase boys around Hinkley Park. What probably upped our popularity the most is the fact that we were cheerleaders. That’’s right—Cheerleaders. We cheered for the Park Ridge Falcon’s football team. Anyone that was a part of the Falcons was considered cool.
We were the middle school’s center of attention.
It seemed that my friends and I were living the life. And I thought I was too. I didn’t know what it was like not having to share friends with my twin sister. The fact that it seemed like they favored her over me didn’t really phase me either—when they came over to my house, it would be considered “Michelle’s house” rather than “Emma and Michelle’s house”—I thought that it was just a part of life. Despite this, didn’t think life could get much better than it already was at that point. I didn’t really pay attention to the world around me. I didn’t really know what other people thought of my friends and me, either.
Eighth grade—What I remember the most from this year was the night before graduation. I lied in bed that night thinking ahead. I’m not usually the type to think much to the future, but that night I did. Something gave me the feeling that things would change for me in high school, and they would change for the better. I knew that I was going to get a clean, fresh start.
Freshman year moved slowly, although things were going well. I was now in high school, but things didn’t seem much different in the first couple of weeks. I still had my friends by my side. Even though I still had my friends, not many of them were in my classes. This almost forced me to make more friends. My new friend was Emily, and Emily and I clung since day one, leading us into talking about absolutely everything. One day, a conversation that we had really made me think.
“So, I was thinking about you earlier,” said Emily.
“Yes, and?”
“And I didn’t realize how differently I thought of you after getting to know you a lot more. You’re so much nicer than I thought you were.
I’m not saying that I’m a complete angel, but I never thought that people looked at me and assumed I wasn’t a nice person.
“Why is that? What made you think that I wasn’t a nice person?”
“Well, I don’t know. From what I can see, your friends really like to put other people down. I’ve seen this happen more than once, and you can tell that they are a little full of themselves. But I don’t think you’re anything like them. I think you have the potential to surround yourself with people that are more like you”.
If there was one thing loved about Emily, it was the honesty. I’ve never met such an honest person in my entire life. Emily made me think twice about whom I was spending my time with and how it affected me as a person. I started to spend more and more time with Emily and some of her friends. One of these friends just so happened to be my long lost kindergarten friend Ellie! Not only did I get to rekindle a past friendship, but I also began new friendships with people that I still call my best friends. This particular group of people made me realize that popularity isn’t everything. As long as you have people there by your side that make you happy and focus on having fun rather than making an impression on people, you are going to have a much better time and life will go by much smoother.
Switching friend groups was easier than I thought. Until this point in time, not only was I oblivious to the fact that popularity isn’t everything, but I also didn’t realize the impact on sharing friends with a twin sister could have on your entire life. No matter what, it is a competition and the most dominant twin wins. My sister won her popularity with my old friends. Even though she won her popularity, I won friends that I know I can keep for a lifetime.