Explanatory Note: The Document

A note of explanation. This was originally going to be a chapter somewhere in the book, but I decided it didn’t fit well anywhere, so I’ll post it as a clarification to readers and as a supplement to this week’s chapter.

It began thus:

This piece will lack a formal introduction, as I feel that the cover page is self-explanatory. Personally, I find my life interesting – a tactical situation which requires careful planning and execution. It is composed of hundreds of ups and downs each day; it is as volatile as the stock market itself. Unlike my “Life Story Site,” Daily Journal, or other such efforts to record my thoughts for later retrieval, this document will not be organized by days and I will not make an attempt to continue this ongoing saga daily. In all due respect, some days are just boring and they do not need to be mentioned or remembered. I also will not group events by their date, as I am writing this as a story, not a diary. With the above in mind, enjoy.

What followed was forty-three pages of rants and raves, ups and downs, victories and losses, bouts of anger and moments of pure bliss. The uncut emotions of a high school freshman, torn by the middle school social system and thrust into the status quo of the regional high school.

It was meant to record my life and later, to persuade. It was an outlet for my anger and creativity alike. It was my Life Story. It was my freshman year.


I had always liked to write. In school, English was my best subject, and on my own, I’d sometimes compose the occasional short story simply for personal enjoyment.


I was not the typical high school freshman. In middle school, I was an individual who could easily be tagged as a nerd, and as many middle school students do, I experienced the trials and tribulations of harassment and teasing. During the eighth grade, I took a position on the “Eighth Grade Government” and student respect increased exponentially. And as many of my peers in middle school did at one point and time, I liked a girl.

The girl’s name was Britney Whitfelt. She was popular (this was back when popularity was a big deal), she was attractive, and she was nice. I didn’t have a chance. But that didn’t stop me. Having never liked a girl, I began by making every possible mistake I could. I told Doug, a distant friend of mine, who happened to be relatively popular and a good friend of Britney’s. He immediately convinced me to allow him to allow him to tell her during lunch the next day. I can still visualize him, getting up across from his lunch table, marching across the cafeteria floor, and stopping at her table. My friends all eagerly looked on in anticipation of what was to come, and I struggled to also get a view.

George, a chubby student whose father was a well-to-do plumber, started laughing. “She choked on her food!” he exclaimed, and the table roared in laughter. I never saw her do it, and knowing George, he very well could have been making the whole thing up. What I do know is that the next day, Doug handed me a small square of glossy paper. A school picture. I stared at it and simply couldn’t make out who it was, eventually concluding that it was another girl I knew. I moved to toss it in my locker.


“Read the back,” Doug told me, obviously not seeing the reaction he expected. I flipped the picture over. On the back was scrawled, in blue pen:

Hey Ross,
What’s up? Hope you’re having a great year!
♥Britney

I smiled. She cared enough to respond. On the bus ride home, there was a girl named Michelle, who was not only Britney’s friend but the gossip queen of middle school. Doug had told her about the picture.


“Did Britney give you something today?” she asked, her voice filled with eager anticipation.


“Yea,” I replied, not quite sure how to react – I wasn’t sure I trusted this girl.


“It was her picture, right?”


“Yea.”


“You know she doesn’t like you.”


And thus began a chain of events that would lead up to The Document. I, upset over Michelle’s words, and unsure what to do, e-mailed Britney. Britney replied, saying that she wasn’t sure why Michelle said what that she didn’t like me, and that she liked me very much as a friend. The e-mail seemed successful, so every time something would not seem right, I’d e-mail Britney, and she’d reply, and everything would seem better.

Freshman year in high school, there were a number of changes. For one, we went from a school with a student population of 300 to a freshman class of 250 people, as we entered the regional high school that Greenwood and it’s neighboring town Salem shared. The social dynamic began to change also, and as I clung onto my own friends, I also sought to forge ties with Britney’s group. I would sit with my friends at lunch, and hers in study hall. I met Megan Feltz, Britney’s closest friend, and tried through study halls to become friends with people in the same social group.


Understandably, I met more than a few roadblocks, including my own (likely accurate) perception that while I was welcomed at the study hall table and permitted to talk with those there, I received little out of school contact and certainly no invitations to do anything extracurricular. I was frustrated, and in order to express my frustration, I turned to my writing. On September 29th, 2001, I began a Microsoft Word document entitled, “My Life.”


At first, I tried to begin writing everyday, however I lacked enough material to keep the document moving and would resort to mindless descriptions of mundane events in my life. Later, after everything had settled, my friend would refer two paragraphs dedicated to describing the process by which I asked for some zucchini muffins from my mother one morning. It scared him more than controversial writing, he told me.

I walked downstairs, where my mom was preparing Zucchini muffins. Many students with whom I have spoken have found the idea of Zucchini muffins revolting, however they are actually quite good. As part of the recipe, 3 cups of sugar must be added, so they end up being quite good.

My mom questioned whether I preferred the larger or the small muffins, and I replied that I would rather have smaller muffins, but would consume either size. I was informed that they we be completed in 10-15 minutes and she would bring them upstairs for me. I proceeded to hike back up the stairs to my computer, which I promptly turned on.

To avoid creating long passages that described practically nothing, I resorted to only writing when I felt there was something necessary to write. This translated to only writing when I felt like complaining or was angry about something, as otherwise I simply wouldn’t see the need to write. Adding to “My Life” became a more a method of relaxation than anything else, I could get my thoughts out on paper, save the file, and proceed with my life.

Several times during my additions, I used phrasing that could have been misinterpreted. In three sentences out of forty three pages of text, I said something along of the lines of the following, “these people should be taken out and shot (not literally, of course),” “I swear, sometimes it frustrates me so much I want to blow up her house (not that I mean that seriously),” and one similarly incendiary line that I cannot remember at the time of this writing. All were marked up to ensure they wouldn’t be misinterpreted in case they were ever read.

I finished up the document on December 3 of the same year, deciding that it had disintegrated into a complaint-ridden document that didn’t have much meaning.

I always had the intention of releasing the document informally when I had concluded it. My original plan was to write it for the duration of the school year, and then follow it with three subsequent sequels, one every year of my high school experience. I would, of course, edit out the controversial sections before I offered up a public release.

And so, on December 4th, that was exactly what I did…removed any section that anyone might find the least bit controversial, and offered it to whomever wanted it.

Three days later, I received an instant message from Megan. She wanted the full document. I initially resisted, but she argued that if we were to be friends there had to be some element of trust involved, and if I couldn’t trust her with the document, how could she trust me? It was a faulty argument I realize now, but at the time it persuaded me, and I sent her the document. She read through it, controversial portions and all, and over the next month or so we discussed it several times, even making a joke out of a few of the controversial portions.

It wasn’t till January that Britney confronted me on the document. In retrospect, it was obvious Megan had already showed it to her and she had likely read it completely. My giving it to her was primarily a symbolic act that indicated that it was acceptable for her to read it. I was even more resistant to provide her a copy of the document as she was much more frequently mentioned, and while I had known her longer, I felt I was much closer friends with Megan.

Britney confronted me on the document in the midst of an argument we were having online, about what I don’t I remember, but she managed to obtain it using a very similar line of reasoning: how could she trust me if I was obviously withholding something from her? Again, a faulty line of reasoning but I fell for it.

I sent her a preliminary e-mail, however, outlining everything I was to talk about in it, explaining the circumstances under which I did most of the writing, and how none of it should be taken seriously. She replied, saying she understood completely, and I replied to her understanding with an attached copy of the file.

We never discussed the document, though Britney continued to talk to me (even more frequently than usual at first) and it wasn’t until the 7th of March that I even heard it mentioned again.