“They only want you when you’re seventeen”
Scene aunty looks back on iconic song from her youth
Back in April, I was reminiscing on an old favorite, the song “Seventeen” by Ladytron. I have used this song to track the passing of years in different ways for well over half of my life.
Before I turned seventeen (the only age that they want you, as the song goes), I aspired to seventeen because of this song. I looked forward to celebrating seventeen with this song. I wanted to be as cool, confident and desired as this song made seventeen sound.
After turning seventeen, as a young straight edger, I dreaded twenty-one (“when you’re twenty-one, you’re no fun” the song’s hook finishes) and becoming what every young punk fears-washed, out of touch, a sell out, a former straight edger who goes—gasp, horror of horrors— to 21+ shows.
Then, as it does, 21 came and went. I listened to this song yet again and laughed. It wasn't so scary after all. I was what I wanted to be, loved and young and glamorous! In a mid-sized Midwest city kind of way.
I spent the years after my 21st going back to this song at different random intervals reflecting on the cuteness of baby scenester Briana tracking her life by an electropop tune.
Today is my thirty-fourth birthday. That means it has been seventeen years since I turned seventeen. As usual I have a lot and nothing to say about this fact, but mostly I wanted to share some extremely earnest, slightly-edited words from seventeen-year old Briana that I published both on my Myspace blog and Facebook at the time. My feelings about the strength and resilience of a young Black girl in West Michigan has since fluctuated in the past seventeen years, but that’s a thought for another time. Here’s to the next seventeen!
Strong, Rock (Life Comes In Full Circle)
(Long, but what I believe to be very worthwhile.
Comments detrimental.)
When I was about eight years old, I was in Meijers in the tacky "glass and porcelain fixtures and figurines that only grandmas and weird orthodox Christians buy" section and I found a rack with little booklets, that you could give to a person on their birthday or whatever occasion that, had their name and information on what their name meant. I scurried over and started to look through them and pick out names I liked. I enviously flipped through what I then thought were pretty names-Joy, Charity, Kaitlyn, Ashley, Desiree, Kacey, Lydia. My heart fluttered when I heard their meanings-beautiful, delicate, soft, angel, loved, flower. After a while of paging through, I found a form of my name, Brianna, and eagerly opened the books tiny pages to find what wonderful meaning my name, though dowdy and weirdly spelled as it were, might mean. Then, to my utter disappointment, I saw that the definition was nothing more than "strong, rock"
I was devastated. Strong? Rock? So what? Does that mean I'm fat? I'm not girly? I'm just a darn rock. Since it was Celtic in origin, the picture that came into my mind was immediately of some big, vulgar-mouthed woman with gross stringy hair, calloused hands throwing stones over rolling hills and scaring away all the thin pretty girls with rolling locks of flaming red hair and cool Riverdance outfits into the surrounding glen and hills. "And besides that," I told myself-"Strong? It's not me. It never will be. I can't even hold myself, let alone anyone else. I am too scared to even tell people to stop picking on me or to just let me be." It being my second grade year at Comstock Park, it was especially true-l was being constantly tormented by poorly educated racists white girls and was too weird to be liked or accepted by anyone else. And since I was four, things were never good at home. I felt so powerless, so weak. Insignificant, unimportant. I was meant to shrink back into the shadows and be forgotten. Abuse, mistreated, and ignored.
But life goes on. I can't even begin to fill the gap between then and now with anything other than that. I never gave up, no matter what. Now, that doesn't mean I never made a mistake or fell. I just always got back up and learned from it. And with each thing that occured, each new experience or lesson taught, I better started to understand myself, my surroundings. What it meant to be me and to not be me. Everything. I became a little smarter, a little quicker. A little more indepedant, a little more accepting of myself and everything that entailed.With that then came the much needed and just as important understanding and acceptance of other people and how they are, just like me-feeling, thinking, intricate, complicated, yet simple and needing at the same time. And in saying this, the hardest part of this growth was seeing the weakness all around me-In myself, In my mother, My father, my pastor, my "friends", my teachers, God even. Everyone just needed to be reduced and stripped so they could be brought back up again as their most honest selves, without the bullshit. I needed that too. and I got it. A point of enlightenment I believe everyone must reach in life to be a truly fulfilled human.
And then, about three years ago, I started to talk about where l'd been and what life meant to me. And people responded. One by one, friends, even total strangers, started to trust, lean, and depend on me like they never would on any other person. I started to become more active in the school's GSA and became outspoken against homophobia and hatred in my midst. It came to a point where It would interfere with school, having to skip class to go to a coffee house and aid friends in emotional emergencies or pull needy acquaintances out of class for a good heart to heart when their eyes looked so hurt and starving. All the knowledge I gained finally served it's full purpose-To give me understanding, and then to also give understanding and love to others through the passing of it in a friendship. I started to gain good friends and the respect of adults through it, and a lot of them started to use that word I once hated so much. "You're the strongest girl l've ever known, Briana,
"You have a lot of insight and strength for a person your age. You're a very wise and strong young woman." At first, there were still remnants of the aversion I once held to it, but it quickly dawned on me, like it never would have without the experiences I had been through, what it truly meant. It took on such a new, fresh, powerful, and beautiful meaning.
Strength-to give, and not to get.
Strength-to be sorry, and to always be willing to give in to another
Strength-to have the ability to rise above ignorance, hatred, evil, and violence with understanding, love, inner peace, and sanctity.
Strength-to stand up for principles, rights, and morals, even when no one else will.
Strength-to be the loudest and most loving humanitarian you can be.
Strength-after recieving, to pass the gift of understanding and acceptance to another human, no matter who.
Strength-to admit when you're weak, when you're wrong, when you can't see the way. to truly be human
Strength-to be you. and, almost just as important, to let others be them.
I no longer wanted to be Charity Or Ashley Or Kacey, or even Lydia. On the contrary, I was so extremely happy with the fruits of my labor, I couldn't imagine being anyone else.
It's been a long time since that one moment at Meijers.
So long.
I know it might be too early to say, and I'm not saying I don't make mistakes and break rank by occasionally judging other people and reverting back to old ways, but I believe in this sense have come full circle as a person, and I have grown so much. I plan on keeping this up and discovering things about myself, my life, the world around me and the people in it with each day I take. I promise to never close my mind or my soul to the next new thing, new thoughts. new ideas. new people. GOD-It's only been seventeen years. I can't wait to see what amazing things to learn and see come up next.
I hope I get to share my experiences with you guys, and that you might have a few to share with me too.
happy birthday :-)