April 3, 2009 @ 5:48am

It's funny when I go into a setting or in orders words, when I am in the company of a group of people and I'm the new kid, I feel challenged when they fawn over me, say that I am pretty, sexy and give me this special attention. I find the attention a bit unsettling, as if it's not deserving or necessary. I keep looking in the mirror expecting to see this so called "pretty" person and all I see is a plain Jane (nothing is wrong with the way Jane looks). For years and every since I was little, I have had people tell me that I was pretty, it's a good thing in one respect but you can tell there is a hint of something in their voice, perhaps envy or at times I felt people were saying it out of frustration, as if somehow I had some control over the way I looked. For many years, I thought I was genuinely ugly and wouldn't look in the mirror. I would wash my face as I showered as well as brush my teeth in the shower to avoid the mirror. My hair, well I never really cared about it, so I left it to chance and that is why for many years, it was a ball of cotton on top of my head with no rhyme or reason. Every so often I would meet someone who would suggest that I must spend lots of time in front of the mirror and when I would tell them how I felt about my looks, they thought I was being modest or at best being very, very funny. I'll never forget the look on the face of a woman asked me how it felt to be apart of the elite group, the group of people who were pretty and I responded that I wasn't pretty and in typical fashion she thought I was just trying to push away the attention. But then it was the shear devastation that swarmed across her face when she realized that I wasn't joking. I thought she might comfort me but she treated me with disdain, telling me I was unappreciative of my looks and how grateful I should be to find favor with the world because I was her so called pretty. People like would always struggle while I would always come up lucky because of my looks. That was a new day for me, needless to say. I hadn't thought of looks as some source of privilege, as some sort of advantage or something with power. I had suspected that was true for other people but not me.
I can recount the incidents I have, they are far too numerous, I could fill a book with them which actually might be a good idea but I've come to a place with my looks and that is, I'm easy on the eyes but I find that my looks are buffered by my fat body and my friendly personality. I've been told enough times that people could hate me but my friendliness helps them cope with my looks. There is this expectation that if you're pretty you're going to be mean but I get the feeling that so called pretty end up mean because we are constantly trying to figure out why people certain ways one minute and another way another minute and yet, all different ways in other all together different moments. I'm not a vain person, nor do I spend any excess time on my looks but I watch the way I look and what it does for me and to me and comes of me.
I had a lover once that use to kiss my face, this was the most healing of acts ever. I appreciated the sincerity in this expression of kindness and love. There was this sense that would come over me, I would feel like the way I look is okay. I look at pictures of myself and I was a very cute baby, my mother reports the volume of attention I received. It's a strange coincidence that by the time I went to grade school, I was wearing glasses but would discover as a young adult that nothing was wrong with my eyes. Glasses was probably my first buffer, being the class clown was my second buffer, putting on weight was my third buffer and people pleasing became the buffer I used to traverse the world. I'm looking at these words and I realize I had not expected to write this, I had not known put into full consciousness what I just expressed in words. I had not taken a serious look at this matter of looks and how I look and how the world perceives my facial dimensions. In all my years of feeling unworthy, to say I was pretty was like throwing an insult at me because people like me didn't deserve to be pretty and I attempted to over compensate, to assure people that my looks were a mistake, an error and nothing that I would remotely consider or pay attention to. But just like life, the more I resisted looking pretty, the more attention I received. The less make-up I wore the more friendly greetings I received, the more doors were open and the more gestures of love that would come my way but when you're not feeling worthy, all that is in your blind spot. I'm not done with this whole looks thing, I still have a ways to go but the truth is I feel as if everyone is good looking, each in their own unique way. I'm not interested in being something that others can't be, I don't have any desire to be special or to be touted as the measure by which others should compare.
Every so often my co-worker says to me that I am very pretty and each time it's as if she is saying for the first time or as if she has rediscovered this fact. I thank her for the compliment and give it no real attention but lately there is this angst in her voice, this perhaps wonderment and it is familiar to me. And just the other day, okay yesterday but it could of been any day, I went into two separate establishments where men had the courage to come up to me and you could tell that everyone in the room were rooting for them, everyone in the room agreed with him when he said I was pretty and everyone wanted him to win. They wanted him to get the pretty girl because I guess somewhere in the social psyche we want people to prevail and win. But when I was reserve but friendly, the mood shifted from the excitement of possibility to the gloom of defeat, all in that moment I had wheeled something amongst those people and hadn't really known at the time. I was sad and heavy burdened. What they failed to realize was that I had had a long day, I was tired and I was not looking good at all, jogging pants and t-shirt but still that does not matter to them. What really matters?
I don't have any need to think I look better, I don't have this need to somehow flaunt or be vain. I just want to be me, the unsure me that is still discovering who she is. The part of me that gets shy when others gang up to tell me how pretty I am. It sends me inward, makes me more self reflective and it makes me want to find the words to tell them that they are beautiful too. Because the truth is when I look at others I see how beautiful they are and unlike me I want them to know it in their hearts. Maybe this is the lesson, to accept myself as a beautiful person first and then maybe in those moments of unexpected attention and you would think after 42 years I would get used to this attention, just maybe I can began to reflect back their beauty and we can join in the moment of delight about ourselves in a mutually enjoyable way.
I am perfect and I am whole and I am complete. I LOVE ME!