Fifth grade was a very hard year for me. I discovered boys. I discovered Lawman jeans were cool. I discovered friends could stab you in the back and that hygiene couldn't be taken care of by a shake of baking soda.

You see, my parents were under the opinion that with four girls, deodorant was an expensive commodity we could do without. This, especially when baking soda was cheap and always available in the kitchen.

Deodorant cost $3 a stick. I mean, who has that kind of money?

This was bad news for me. I have always been a Sweaty Betty. (no offense to Betty). The payoff is great skin, but you are always sweaty. The bane of my existence has been deodorant and B.O. related from the start of second grade.

I recall that dark day when my stepmom handed us four girls a set of shakers to share. These shakers were rather like the red pepper flake dispensers at the pizza parlor, except these things were full of baking soda.

To shake. Into your pits.

It doesn't take a science major to know that baking soda is prone to clumping in wet environments. And it did.

Every morning I would faithfully shake baking soda into the caverns of my arms. I'd end up spilling white powder on my clothes and hating the moment that would come a few hours later. The moment of catching wind of my fragrant..er..., flagrant self.

Being an odoriferous sort, I would nearly die of embarrassment when I would nonchalantly raise my arm and a small clod of baking soda would fall out of my armpit. It would happen at the most inopportune times. Seriously. No boy would come within ten feet of me. I stood three heads taller and was marked with white clods and raging B.O. That's hawt!

I would pray, "PLEASE let there be no clods in my pits. PLEASE let their be no clods in my pits." It was mortifying. By mid morning though, you'd think my body was having some gruesome white clod fall out.

Despite my baking soda pits, B.O., and dusted t-shirts, I had trouble making friends. I remember one morning, going over to my desk to start my school day.

There it sat. A gigantic, Sunny D yellow, toile-covered basket perched upon my desk. This was not any basket, it was a JEAN NATE' bath and body basket. I stood dumbfounded wondering who would be so kind to do that? Soap, lotions, a little deodorant, and more soap....all in that glorious golden yellow packaging. I was so excited. I felt special.

I didn't realize, the assistant teacher was giving it to me because I stunk like jockey shorts. She may have thought that I (or my parents) needed some help in that department. I can remember my stepmom coming unglued when she found out I was given this basket by a teacher. Naturally, I didn't understand. Why it was such an offensive gift? I had baking soda covering my pits. My B.O. couldn't have been that bad!

Add big teeth, bean pole body, mean school mates, and a slight awkwardness. That would pretty much be my fifth grade year in a nut shell. No, there was also the lunches...but I'll save that for next post.

I'm thankful now for that embarrassing lesson. Fifth grade could have been easier but I'm armed with first-hand memories to know exactly how my daughter feels at this age.

For the record. I already buy them deodorant. You can be Sure of that.