In the seventh and eighth grade I went through some amazing growth spurts. I seriously grew like 4 inches in a month. OK, I don't really know the exact number, but I do know I had some embarrassing growing pains. Think awkwardly tall and skinny.
I had these pink sweatpants that had elastic at the feet. I didn't really care for them, so I decided they would be the perfect thing to wear on a Saturday when no one would see me. I took them to a sleepover, and boy was I surprised (embarrassed) when I put them on the next morning. They were hideously tight and short, but I wore them because it was that or wear the pants I had worn the day before, which was even more disgusting and embarrassing. I still wonder what her family thought of me that day. . . hopefully they've forgotten this incident. I, obviously, have not.
I think it was about that time I told my parents I needed some new pants. I can remember trying on purple jeans, jeans with puzzle pieces on the legs, jeans with Mickey Mouse plastered on the sides. Yikes.
I went to school rockin' those new pants and this boy on the bus said, "You got some pants that fit." Thanks, dude.
I ran cross country for six years. I can remember girls laying on the locker room benches with their tapered-leg jeans while other girls tried to pull those tight ankle-suckers off.
In eighth grade the movie Sister Act 2 came out, and those girls had some straight-leg, maybe even bell-bottomish pants on. I thought they looked pretty good, so I bought me some and wore them to school. A different really awesome guy said, "Hey Jenn, are you missing the 60's?" I explained to him that tapered-legs were out and bell-bottoms in. And what do you know? The next year everyone was wearing flare-leg jeans. The bigger the cooler.
My mom used to always tell me these stories about her elephant pants that she tripped on, and about her mom wearing peg-leg pants and being embarrassed about it, and how then the tapered pants came back in. One big circle because apparently we can't come up with new ideas and the fashion industry needs to keep taking our money.
Probably about 5 years ago I grabbed a bunch of on-sale pants to try on at Old Navy. Skinny jeans. I thought they were supposed to make me look skinny, so you can imagine my surprise when I tried them on and they were tapered-leg pants! NO WAY! I couldn't believe that someone was going to try and pull those back into fashion--they are so not complimentary to a girl's figure (not mine, anyway).
Boy was I wrong. I went to a youth dance not too long ago and guys and girls were wearing skinny jeans (or peg-leg, or tapered-leg, you choose your name).
Anyway. That's my story.
