Are you one of the many who had braces as a child? If so, I’m sure you will remember the braces, the rubber bands, the retainers. You may have worn them at a time when you wanted least to stand out in a crowd and felt pretty noticeable with the shiny silver gleaming through a timid smile.<\/p>\n
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As years have passed by, braces have become more popular and many people have worn them.<\/p>\n
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I remember my mother asked me about getting them when I was younger. I did not want braces and did not want to stand out already more than my five foot eleven inch frame did so I didn’t get them. That was a mistake I regretted later when I was in college and in early adulthood. However, at that point in my life it was not fashionable or affordable for me, so I didn’t worry about it.<\/p>\n
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Seven years ago I was watching television one evening and one of the many commercials ran across the screen. It was an advertisement for braces.<\/p>\n
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“Hum.” I thought. I think I’ll look into that.<\/p>\n
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I did and before long I, too, had on the shiny hardware.<\/p>\n
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I was a school counselor then and the kids just loved that their counselor had braces like they did. We compared war stories about them, if and when we would be wearing rubber bands, how long they would have to stay on, what color bands one is wearing this month, the sensitivity, missing chewing gum and popcorn, etc. If you ever wondered if you could relate to students, wearing braces will make it clear. Students like to see adults wearing braces. I think they want to know we feel their pain…and you do feel pain when wearing them. It was a positive experience most of the time.<\/p>\n
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I always wore the regular bands – no colors for me. That is, until the day I was convinced to try orange ones on for the month. It was Halloween and Thanksgiving and orange would “match” the season. I thought the kids would get a kick out of that. They did, especially when the Clemson\/Carolina game came up and I was wearing orange.<\/p>\n
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I was a Carolina fan.<\/p>\n
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That was the last time I wore color bands.<\/p>\n
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Then there was the time when I had to wear the rubber bands to connect the lower and upper hardware. They would often pop off at the most peculiar times.<\/p>\n
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Once, while I was having a classroom guidance activity and was running short on time to finish, I was talking faster than usual and one of the rubber bands popped out and landed on the student desk in front of me. That was the talk of the class for quite awhile.<\/p>\n
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From then on I had to “warn” the students that a rubber band may pop off when I talked during class visits.<\/p>\n
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I love to sing and was singing in my choir one Sunday when one of the bands popped. Of course, it did not just fall to the floor. It landed in the big hairdo of the lady in front of me and it went deep into the dark brown locks. I tried to get it out without her knowing but she thought I was playing and slapped my hand. So, I left it there. It wasn’t there the next time, but she still had a disgusting look on her face when she saw me for several practices after that.<\/p>\n
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Yes, braces can make a remarkable difference in one’s appearance and I have always been pleased with how mine turned out.<\/p>\n
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My wish for you today<\/strong> is that you get braces if you need to and enjoy the experience. If you don’t need them, be mindful of those who are wearing them and stay clear of fast talking, rubber band wearing, brace wearers. You may just be the recipient of a rubber band if you don’t.<\/p>\n \n ~ Joellen<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Are you one of the many who had braces as a child? If so, I’m sure you will remember the braces, the rubber bands, the retainers. You may have worn them at a time when you wanted least to stand out in a crowd and felt pretty noticeable with the shiny silver gleaming through a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,16,27,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education","category-life-events","category-living-life-to-the-fullest","category-teenagers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reflectionsfromacountrygirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}