8th grade girls= toughest audience ever

So today I started my new job with the Girl Scouts. Yes, I can get you cookies. I will be in charge of "facilitating" a program about wise spending and saving habits. Facilitate is a long word that basically means "do". What I will "do" is hang out with some middle-school-age girls and tell them to be quiet alot and teach them how to make money by, what else, selling cookies. At first glance, this sounds manipulative, and it kind of is. It's also legitimately instructive though and the more I think about it, the more I wish the program was longer than the six scheduled sessions. I want to get to know these girls. I wish I could make some tiny impression on their lives at this critical age when they still have so many choices and second chances. The older girls- the eighth graders- sit on the edge of a precipice. Some seem already to have fallen over. They know everything, think in groups and revolve their energies around lusting after boys and expensive shoes and clothes. They have all the desires of women- some even have the bodies of women, but none of the wisdom. Pain and loss is in their future, whether or not I can get through to them, and I could see it in their eyes.

Today I watched the reactions of several classes ranging from 5th to 8th grade. The youngest were eager, attentive, impressionable. As they got older you could watch them grow less and less reachable. By high school, if they are not already motivated to become something other than a hood rat, most of their teachers will have stopped trying. The recess area was right outside our classroom door and two girls got in a fist fight during a break. I don't know which grade they were in.

I saw my middle school self in some of the girls today. I was the dorky one who wanted to answer all the questions- the easy sell. I was the girl shushing the loud mouths. For that reason, I don't know anything about what it takes to get the attention of the popular girls with the attitude problem. I'm terrified of them and suddenly a range of emotions comes back to me from some not-so-far-off place. "I hope they like me." "I hope they think I'm cool." I take comfort in the thought that their idea of cool: someone with Air Jordans and a pair of Apple Bottom jeans, is a fairly shallow construct. Maybe it won't be too hard to tear down and replace with something more substantial. Maybe I can start their, get them to talk about the kind of person they respect, and go ahead and admit that that isn't me. Maybe they'll appreciate that I'm leveling with them and take what I'm offering them more readily. Maybe they'll eat me alive.....