After my mini freakout in my Xterra, I clambered out with my backpack, took in one final deep breath before slamming the driver's side door shut, and plodded across the parking lot towards the concrete nuclear bunker that is my college. I was visibly nervous and jumpy. Every person, car, and leaf around me felt like an existential threat. I could hear my heartbeat in my ears. I could feel my nostrils flaring with every quick breath like those of a galloping Thoroughbred. I held my keys in my pocketed hands, nervously rubbing the rough, dry scales of my gator paw keychain like a worry stone. Despite me wearing a hoodie and it being about 75 degrees outside and 72 inside, I felt ice cold. Almost hypothermic. Fear can't even come close to the emotions I was feeling as I avoided the elevators (which I also have a phobia of) and ventured up four flights of concrete stairs.
The whole time I spent heading to my classroom, on top of that intense terror I struggled to hide, I felt grossly ashamed and embarrassed of myself. No adult that I knew of was as terrified of things as I was. Everyone else seemed perfectly relaxed. Many were even smiling and laughing with each other, excited to begin a new year. But me? I was cold, teary-eyed, and shaking. I was the only student on that entire campus who'd rather hoof it up four flights of stairs than take the elevator due to intense social anxiety and claustrophobia. And, when I finally got to my classroom with five minutes to spare, I could hear a few students who were seated in the very front row of the miniature lecture hall, laughing and talking loudly with the professor.
"Oh. My. Fuckin'. God." I silently thought to myself as I stopped mid-stride in the hallway, watching my fellow students and the professor from behind the doorframe, "I'm in hell."
Quietly, I poked my head in around the door, searching for the emptiest table that was furthest away from the lectern, when the professor noticed.
"Hi!" she loudly announced startling me, "Come right in! You're not late, we just started early."
Naturally, every student in that room turned around to stare at me. Class hadn't even begun yet, and I was already getting flashbacks to all the times I'd come to school late back in K-12 due to being sick that morning. Only, instead of a classroom of twenty or so kids, I was being stared down by a miniature lecture hall of almost forty adults. Including all of the excited extroverts at the front of the classroom, seemingly hoping I was adoptable somehow. Trust me, I know that look extroverts have when they spot an introvert in need of adoption.
For another few seconds, I remained frozen, staring wide-eyed at all those pairs of eyes staring back at me. I felt my heartrate skyrocket even more as I seriously considered booking it down the hall, out onto the fourth-floor balcony, and jumping into a nearby ponderosa tree to slow my fall as I made my great escape. But, I decided against that. Not because it was a bad idea to jump down four stories, but because I figured that would be way more embarrassing than being stared down by almost forty people as I stumbled my way to a faraway table.
Again, words can't describe just how utterly afraid and unwelcome I felt as I found my seat and began to unpack. Logically, I knew nobody was watching me anymore and nobody was judging me when I timidly stepped into the room. In fact, the professor welcomed me in with a warm smile. However, emotionally speaking, I felt like I'd just stepped into a den of forty lions with a belt of lamb chops clasped around my waist. At any moment, those things were gonna pounce on me, and it would be terrible.
Of course, no such thing happened that morning. In fact, I was able to sit silently and listen intensely when class officially began and the professor began to go over the syllabus with us. I'd already gone through it several times on my own, including during the previous evening at my writer's group where I spent most of that time catastrophizing about my class (and possibly annoying my friends, which if I did, I'm sorry you had to watch me suffer). Even then, I felt severely unprepared for that class, because I was just so damn terrified. And I was (and still am) afraid that my terror wouldn't go away, and it would cause me to fail miserably.
Plus, there were a lot of students who were clearly excited to do their speeches. I could see it in their bright smiles, shrill voices and squeals, excited hand gestures, bubbly, theater kid personalities, and how they eagerly raised their hands whenever the prof asked a question. Meanwhile, only a handful of students (myself included) were stiff and silent, petrified with fear.
Maybe (probably) my perception was just warped at that moment. Maybe everyone in that class was scared shitless, and the way many of them coped with being scared shitless was to talk everyone's ears off whenever they got the chance, in an attempt to ease the tension and anxiety they were feeling.
But, to my silent, cross-armed, anxious self at that moment, those people were the epitome of attention-seeking extroverts. They downright terrified me. It was like I was in a room with about twenty clones of my very enthusiastic and extroverted mom, and I was gonna totally fail and embarrass myself in front of all of them, because I was just too damn scared to compete.
However, the professor spent most of class laying out the ground-rules to make the classroom a safe, welcoming, judgement-free environment for us to get used to (or at least, relatively good at) public speaking. Logically, I already knew nobody was gonna film me or laugh at me before I stepped foot in class. But, I needed to hear it from the professor and see my peers nodding their heads, if I was gonna feel just safe enough to participate in class. Plus, it always felt comforting when the professor made it clear, time and time again, that neither she or us will criticize a person's character. We're grading and analyzing the speech, not the person. One can disagree with a person's opinion, or find them boring or pretentious, but criticizing those types of things weren't allowed.
Reminds me of the type of environment that allowed me to open up my writing to certain people, which was (and is) awesome.
Once the rules of class were set, the professor went on to demonstrate our first assignment of the semester.
"It's usually called a Brown Paper Bag speech," The professor explained, "Basically, you are to bring three items in a bag that represent who you are. It's like show-and-tell, but for adults. Now, I think paper bags are boring, so I suggest you bring a tote bag or a more specific shopping bag instead. Unless, of course, you want to bring your items in a paper bag, you can... But, this is meant to be a fun, ice-breaker speech, and therefore a more exciting bag would be better than a boring ol' paper bag."
The obvious extroverts in the class were practically ready to bounce off the walls with excitement. I mean, who doesn't like to talk about themselves and show their shit off? Well... At least a handful of us (including myself) weren't all too excited about it. Personally, I wasn't worried about the grading process. I knew 90% of my grade for that speech was based on whether or not I showed up with three items. The other 10% was for participating in the asking and answering of questions. It was really just a way for everyone to get to know each other, and begin to figure out their speech styles and abilities.
However, I was downright scared shitless, and I was struggling to think about what I had at home that would represent me, without letting myself be too vulnerable, of course.
