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[seasidefics]

all i do is reflect and talk about the past, i'm sorry. but i've been thinking about this incident from childhood and lowkey wanted thoughts on whether i'm still being extremely sensitive and this was the right approach, or whether it was kinda mean of the other people.

basically, there was this house at the end of my childhood street that had a total of four kids. the older two were at least 5 years older than me. the daughter was already in high school when i was in elementary school, and then they had two smaller children (which the daughter shared the same name as me lol), and they were like 5 or 6 years old. i think i was anywhere from 9–11 at the time.

anyways, me and my best friends, who were all around my age, would frequent their house to honestly use the trampoline and follow the oldest girl around like lost puppies. i've talked about her before, but i really loved hanging out with her since she was heavily into the arts and would use me and my bestie as guinea pigs for projects.

anyways, one day i had gone over there as usual, and that day the entire family/house had decided to stage a fake intervention?? every single person hid (the older kids, or maybe they weren't there? my friends, the parents), so it was just me and the two younger children. i don't know how much time passed, but in my brain it was A Lot at the time, and i just remember calling out for anyone and they all ignored me until i started to sob.

basically, they came out to say they did it because i only went to their house to play with my friends and acted like it was a meeting ground instead of their home. also, i’m pretty sure it was my friend who explained this to me, not even the parents themselves...

and looking back, they had a fair point. it was selfish of me to just go to someone else's house, use their backyard toys, and then basically leave. and i should've included the smaller kids more, though that also makes me confused since i did play with them. we always played the 'crack the egg' game on the trampoline, and they were the egg'!!?? but just the way they went about it... the parents being like the masterminds behind it all... and i genuinely still don't understand why, out of my friend group, i was the one singled out.

i genuinely think it was because i was reserved even back then, so while i included (or tried to) the other kids, i probably didn't actively talk to them or be super extroverted and invite them. i've always had the approach of letting others come to me.

anyways, i think this was the catalyst for me having a huge fight with my same-age best friend k and why we suddenly stopped speaking to each other. i remember we had a big argument, i said stupid stuff that was so cringey to say, and i was definitely in the wrong with that fight, but i could never remember what it was even about or what started it. i just remember it happening around the same time as this.

i think about this incident a lot, tbh. like i don’t wanna be all “woe is me,” but i do think it lowkey had a lasting effect on how i socialize, or just really made me anxious in group settings like that and going to other people’s houses.

 

anyways, i wish the parents had just sat me down alone and told me their frustrations. i probably still would’ve cried and been upset, but that would’ve been a lot better than everyone gleefully doing whatever that was. i feel like it was just a game to them, since my best friends at the time were so giddy about it.
 

when i think about it more rationally, i guess they were showing me the feeling i made the younger two have(and in their own home at that), whether it was intentional or not, and that wasn’t nice of me since that wasn’t a good feeling whatsoever.

ugh, i can’t even remember if i apologized,...well, i’m pretty sure i did in the confrontation, but i’m like 93% sure i just never went back to that house after that. i think it was around the time my dad got sick, so i had already started to isolate myself before even really understanding what that was...

i wish i could apologize to the two younger kids at least. i wonder if they even remember it.

 edit/update: retold entire story to sister j, and she understands the younger kids’ side and doesn’t think it was as bad as i’m describing. and maybe she is right. i think i retell the story from the mindset i was in at the time, so it’s much more “evil” and dramatic in my head than what it was like irl.