I use to be able to analyze and dissect someone’s outer appearance perfectly; at least that’s what I thought. This negative aspect of being human is somewhat unavoidable. People have a habit of “judging a book by its cover”. People always feel that they know, and understand who someone is by the way they stand, the way they dress, and the way they look, when in fact they know nothing about the person, but why do people do this?
When I was in seventh grade I had already established who my best friend was. I knew that I would never replace her, or add anyone else into our circle of friendship that only I and she understood. However I didn’t know that my best friend had another close friend, however this “other girl” didn’t have the same title as me being the “best friend”. My best friend introduced me to this “other girl” and once I laid eyes on her I knew for a fact me, and her would never be friends. I walked cautiously up to her, because I had already “caught a vibe” from her, I felt as if she was negative, and completely stuck up. The way she stood, allowed me to continue with my judgmental analysis of her. She stood up as tall as a tree, with perfect posture, giving me a feeling that she was self centered, and arrogant. When she opened her mouth, she said “hi, my names Khayla”, her tone was full of a rotten attitude, and she gave me the feeling that she had already prejudged me as well.
Eventually the air between, Khayla, Ashley and myself, grew with awkwardness, and tension. Khayla continued to talk, but it seemed to be a forced conversation only to occupy the awkwardness of the atmosphere that we created. After this awful encounter with this stuck up girl, I continued to build my friendship with Ashley, and avoid Khayla. Unfortunately fate brought us back together in honors algebra I class that following year. This was our first year being in honors classes, I didn’t know anyone else besides her, and she didn’t know anyone also. I didn’t want to sit next to her; however there were no more available seats other than the one beside her. Eventually comparing our schedules led us to realize we had several classes in common. In each class we stuck by each other’s side, and began to surpass the small talk, and actually began having lengthy conversations with each other. She wasn’t as bad as I thought, she was much like myself, a nice sense of humor and really down-to-earth. Ashley, Khayla, and I began to hang out with each other more and more, and the circle of friendship that was exclusive to only Ashley and I expanded allowing one more person in.
It is unbelievable that Khayla and I became best friends, because we both judged each other, simply from the way each other looked. Judging Khayla led me to do a lot of self reflection. I began to realize that I could not tell who someone was if I didn’t get to know them. One cannot tell another person’s personality, or style through the façade that they hold up throughout the day. I promised myself, from that day forward, that I would never judge someone as far as not giving them a chance to become my friend.
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