Why I'm Not Famous

Speaking of fame, the closest I ever got was in elementary school - we were graduating/promoting/going from the fifth grade to the sixth.

I, being a good little student well liked by at least my teachers, had gotten the best grades in the school in my graduating class and was kind of the valedictorian, except I didn't get a give a speech. As such, I got called up on stage to get an award, which I hadn't known about beforehand.

I flounced up the stairs to my elementary school cafeteria stage, resplendent in a brand new teal polo shirt and skort outfit, my floofy ponytail bouncing behind me, to shake the principle's hand and get a shiny plaque celebrating my accomplishment. Afterward, the whole way home, everybody - teachers, classmates, parents, relatives, kids I didn't know, everybody - came up and congratulated me on my "accomplishment", on what a "good job" I'd done, on how I was a "great kid" and they'd "miss me".

I was overwhelmed. Instead of just going home to a nice dinner with just my family, where I could relax and stuff my face with pasta, I was stuck for some time after the ceremony, taking pictures with everyone and getting all the attention and not eating the stuffed shells that I knew lay waiting at home.

Everybody loved me, and I hated it.

I couldn't not smile, couldn't stop repeating "thank you", "you too", "I'm sure it was close", etc. I couldn't breathe I couldn't comprehend everything that was going on, I was overwhelmed. I wasn't consuming my cheesy saucy carb-filled deliciousness.

That 15 minutes of being the most popular kid in my 700 person elementary school proved to me that I never wanted to be really famous. I couldn't even handle slight notoriety in a limited context; being truly well known, where everyone thinks they have a right to you and what you do and think and say, would probably kill me. I would never be able to relax, let my guard down, and enjoy it.


I've always had issues with people watching me.

I stopped posting negative stuff here for a while because I'd always get concerned people asking what was wrong.  I put on personas and change my affect around people I don't know. I can play the "Find the Hidden Security Camera" game on hard mode. I've got tape over my laptop camera. I've turned off location tracking on my phone. I'm hyperaware that as I'm writing this right now over school Internet with at least two eye-in-the-skys watching me, every keystroke, every website I visit, is being recorded along with my identity by the school in association with my identity.

I really hate being watched because it makes me hyperaware of myself and everything I'm doing "wrong". It's like the "you are now manually breathing" trick - it makes me pay attention even when I know what's going on and how everything works. It doesn't help that the modern world is a panopticon of cameras, trackers, and spyware where you never know who is looking at whom.

At least when it's overt, when it's people I know and that I can see, I can analyze a situation and react appropriately - and I've gotten a lot better at that since elementary school.

So, my dear anonymous audience - like, comment, and subscribe - I like knowing who I have to avoid. ;)