The Significance of You

Fellow generational blogger JenX67 recently wrote a really smart piece about how her many pairs of Nikes have carried her through the various stages of her life. It immediately reminded me of an old Nike ad I’d torn out of a magazine 20 years ago. It was eight pages long—unheard of in the typical rules of brevity in advertising—and began with the phrase, “You were born a daughter.”






It replayed some of the desires and dreams girls all have when we're little.

























It evolved through many of the typical insecurities girls go through growing up.



No matter what you went through, the ad touched on it. You were included.



When I first saw it, I was 19 years old; I had no boyfriend, no job, had dropped out of college and had just moved back in with my parents. I didn’t know what the heck to do with my life. My ideas changed daily but were backed by no real motivation. I was living in a new town and didn’t know anyone.



And then finally...




"You became significant to yourself."






Yesterday I did a quick Google search for phrases from the ad. I was amazed to find other blogs mentioning it, other women talking about how they, too, had ripped out and saved that ad. One talked about taping it to her wall where it stayed for years…and then dozens of her readers commented that they had also ripped, taped, and saved.

This was a brilliant campaign, not just because we all remembered the slogan of JUST DO IT, but because we internalized the core message. It successfully appealed to the deep motivational pit in the souls of women across America, from teenager to middle age. Apparently even Oprah herself read it on an episode of her show.

It was written by then-32-year-old copywriter Janet Champ, whose message was that women who take responsibility for everyone else needed to take care of themselves. Later Nike ads written by Champ (how perfect of a name is that?) further championed the power within women while simultaneously challenging outdated beliefs on the capabilities of women. Not only did she inspire the athlete within us, she inspired legions of burgeoning writers, myself included. Don Draper could learn a thing or two from this chick!

Over the years when I'd rediscover the pages in my notebook, I would mentally check off the items in the copy that I’d reached in my life thus far. If I found that I’d reached another one, I think it reassured me that maybe my life wasn’t so off track after all, that I was just running through the normal milestones at my own pace. Many times the ad's message was in the back of my mind when I made a major life decision; when I ended that relationship that felt too confining, when I enrolled in graduate school at 37, when I started putting my writing out there for the world to see.

I think that becoming significant to yourself has different meanings at different ages. Early on it means finding your voice, standing up for yourself. Later it means letting go of outside influences and negative peers, following your dreams. Later still it can mean regaining an independence you might have set aside for years when you chose to devote your energies to family.

In any instance, it's a profound realization to make the commitment to be significant to yourself...for the first time, or once again.

"Because you know it's never too late to have a life. And never to late to change one."

The Smile as Bright as a Painted Bunting

I had a disturbing dream last night. I often have vivid dreams which I remember the next day, and they are usually filled with characters from what my husband calls “central casting.” One dream will be populated with random people from my entire life, usually who’ve never met each other, but they’ve all crossed my path at one time. But this dream was more striking in its choice of characters.

I dreamed that I was living in a new apartment and went next door to meet my neighbor. He was nobody that I can place in my mind. But then his roommate walked in, and I recognized his face and name though I know I’ve never met him in real life. He’s the older brother of a friend from high school, J. I told him my name, but before I could say anything further, the brother recognized me. He said, “I know who you are. J’s face would always light up whenever he talked about you.”

That is the part that makes my heart ache. About 3 years ago J killed himself. I found out about it by reading the obituaries in the newspaper. I was unaware at the time that we were living in the same city. We had lost touch since high school, and this was before everyone was on Facebook. There was a picture accompanying the obit, so there was no second-guessing who it was. Those dimples were unmistakable. It was unreconcilable in my mind that this face that so often lit up so beautifully was now forever dimmed.

A few months later I found out more details of the incident and what precipitated it, which made me hurt even more. It seems J was working at a restaurant at the time, and I realized that by pure coincidence I had gone to that very restaurant the day before he died. But our group ultimately decided to eat across the street instead because the wait was too long at J’s restaurant.
For a long time I thought if only we’d gone there as planned, I would have seen him and we would have hugged and talked and we would have exchanged numbers or emails. I kept thinking that meeting might have been a tiny spark of joy in his obviously troubled mind. That spark might have led to a phone call that might have changed future events.

But it didn’t. If only, if only….

So I’m left with the vision in my dream, of a brother I’ve never met telling me that I meant something to this lost friend.

In my pile of mementos I have a note that J had written to me in high school. It’s covered in hearts and smiley faces. I’m not sure why I saved it for so many years; it doesn’t say anything particularly special, just one of those notes you write when you’re bored in class. “Maybe we can go out next weekend,” he said.

Think but this, and all is mended...

I had an eye-opening dream last night. I dreamt that amends were made in a confusing relationship that dates back 30 years.

From elementary through middle school I had one best friend. We had all our classes together, we practiced gymnastics together, were both very much girly girls. We were competitive in school but only to the point of motivating each other to do better, we never got jealous if the other did better on a test. We incessantly wrote notes back and forth. It all made sense.

In junior high things were a little different; we were still friends but there was a growing distance between us. We didn’t have many classes together and we were starting to make new friends in our bigger school.

By sophomore year of high school, there was no trace that a friendship had ever existed. We wouldn’t speak to each other, we couldn’t look each other in the eye, we didn’t even acknowledge the other’s presence. To this day, I have no idea why. Our lack of relationship made no sense to me. We hadn’t had a fight, we weren’t rivals over the same boy, and no amount of “what’s wrong?” questioning got me anywhere with her.

There was no conversation about it; she simply decided we were not friends anymore. And that was it. I lost my best friend.

As dumb luck would have it, we both made the JV cheerleading squad that year. How ironic that the team whose sole reason of existence—to promote teamwork and unity—had such divisive hatred within its own ranks. I clearly remember the coach instructing the two of us to be partners in a stunt, and neither of us budged. We both stood firmly in our spots, waiting for the other to take the first step. “MOVE IT, girls!” the coach demanded. Reluctantly we complied and formed the base of the world’s most angry pyramid.

I have a picture of us performing another partner stunt, again not of our own free will, and the look of utter disdain on her face for having to actually touch me is heartbreaking to me even now. What made me SO unworthy of her acceptance? I know I did nothing wrong. But, sadly, this question continued to nag at me for 2 decades.

I hate that it still bothers me. It makes me feel like I’m emotionally stunted, unable to get over a simple relationship. Friendships come and go all the time, part of the circle of life, right? This wasn’t the first friendship I’d lost nor was it the last.

But I feel it nonetheless, and denying it would be denying a portion of my human existence. For whatever reason, the abrupt ending of this friendship affected me. It broke something in me that has remained with me all this time, like a broken secondhand of a clock that just hangs downward, unable to spin. It doesn’t affect that day-to-day functioning, but it sure would be nice to restore it to what it once was.

But back to the dream. It was simple. In it I was attending my high school 20-year reunion, which in reality I will be attending in a few months. In the dream, she and I are walking toward each other, and before I can walk the opposite direction or look away, she speaks to me. While I can’t remember the exact words—as often happens in my dreams—the sentiment was crystal clear: she simply put an end to the feud. There was no blame placed and no apology made, but one wasn’t needed.

It was as if we simultaneously popped a bubble of anger that had been encircling each of us.

I woke rather suddenly from this dream, and remembered it immediately, feeling like I was still in it. I had a sense of peace, as if the exchange had really taken place between us.

The “why” of it all doesn’t matter anymore. For over 20 years it did, but I now realize we could easily spend 20 more years rehashing the “why” in an endless circle, and likely still not accomplish anything.

I never hated her. I only treated her badly then because she treated me badly first, and in the world of teenage girls you can’t look like you’re just taking the abuse. Never let them see you sweat and never let them know they got to you.

The reasons for our actions back then most likely wouldn’t make sense now. They’d either hurt or embarrass one or both of us to air them, and neither of those feelings is necessary in order to move ahead. We both had other personal issues we were struggling with in our respective lives that the other didn’t know about and which influenced our actions. We were young and emotionally immature, unable to deal with everything falling on us.

Two things keep repeating in my mind. A few lines from the closing monologue by Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream:

If we shadows have offended
Think but this, and all is mended…
Give me your hands if we be friends
and Robin shall restore amends.

The other is a few lines from Sarah McLachlan’s song “Adia,” which I never knew the story behind, but from the first time I heard it, it has always reminded me of this friend:

we are born innocent
believe me Adia, we are still innocent
it's easy, we all falter does it matter?
believe me Adia, we are still innocent...