Loud

You’re being too loud. 

Loud?

That is was my teacher told me when I was only six 

At six years old I had received my first criticism 

I made it my mission to turn quiet. 

To fade into the background. 

To let my voice hide away as I sat quietly. 

I was too loud.

You’re being too quiet. 

My teacher the next year told me when I was seven.

Quiet?

I didn’t understand how I could move from too loud to too quiet in a year.

Still I allowed the words to drill themselves into my mind. 

I never liked the thought of quiet

I made it my mission to be loud.

Not so loud that I annoyed everyone around me 

But not too quiet so that I would fade into the background

I was too loud and too quiet. 

You’re too boyish.

My teacher told me this when I was nine. 

I looked around at the students surrounding me

I couldn’t find a difference between them and me.

I couldn’t see what made me boyish. 

That was when I learnt, clothes and colours have genders just as much as people do.

I stopped wearing my blue shorts and replaced them with a pink dress and buckle shoes. 

I was too loud, too quiet, and too boyish. 

You’re too girlish.

My boy-friends told me this when I was eleven.

They said thats why they didn’t want to play with me.

I took off my pink dress and put on a blue one. 

Then I believe that the blue turned me into a boy 

But the dress made me look like a girl.

It was perfect. 

I was too loud, too quiet, too boyish and too girlish.

You’re too sarcastic. 

My friends told me this when I was twelve

I didn’t understand.

How could I be a word I didn’t even know the meaning of? 

I googled it when I got home. 

Google told me it meant I used irony to mock people as a joke.

My next google search was ‘what does irony mean’. 

I told myself to never be sarcastic again.

I told myself that it would make people see me in an ugly way 

I didn’t want to be ugly.

I was too loud, too quiet, too boyish, too girlish and too sarcastic. 

You’re too nice. 

My friends told me this when I was thirteen.

I didn’t understand how being too nice was bad. 

They told me it made me a push-over.

I then decided to learn the word ‘no’. 

I then learned to stop smiling and being polite.

I was too loud, too quiet, too boyish, too girlish, too sarcastic and too nice. 

You’re too much of a nerd.

My friends told me this when I was fourteen. 

They told me this when I talked about things I loved.

Like reading, Harry Potter and Marvel. 

They told me I was a nerd because I liked what I liked and got excited about it.

I buried that part of myself the next day.

I stopped talking about what I enjoyed, and once again I began to fade into the background. 

I heard my first words of criticism at the age of six. 

Like any other child wishing to be liked I over-corrected. 

Again and again and again. 

I did it until the little girl that was told she was too loud was finally silent. 

I am sixteen. 

I am too loud.

I have loud opinions and thoughts and I share them with the world 

I have a loud mind and an even louder voice to pare with it. 

I get told I am too loud.

But what must I do with a world screaming at me if not to scream back.

I still fall silent.

I am quiet on the days I am too tired to be loud.

I have learnt not to have that silence make me fade into the background. 

I am loud and quiet and boyish and girlish and sarcastic and nice and nerdy. 

I don’t think the ‘too’ belongs in the sentence anymore. 

I am merely someone who wants to know what it is like to be loved and that is all I wanted.

But no one loved me. 

Not when I was me.

Not when I corrected.

I have learnt that those are the people you must leave behind

Because I am a girl who is fighting for a seat at the table 

And I want to be me when I get there.

Not what I am told to be.