The hardship of being a teenager
I stand in front of the mirror and stare. I do this often. I scan my face and my body for signs of maturity that is bound to come some day, but somehow with me, unlike all my classmates, it is taking its time. While other girls are filling out their semi sheer blouses with their newly grown breasts, gently placing their prized possessions back into the cups of their ostentatious lacy bras after gym class, I hang around them, looking gawky, flat-chested, all knees and elbows, missing my long hair that I could hide behind that was lopped off mercilessly over the summer due to the lice that I brought home with me from summer camp. As we all change out of our sweaty track suits, the girls are turned around, facing the wall, blushing at the thought of someone catching a glimpse of their brand new rounded shapes. With my short stringy greasy hair, non-existent breasts and hips, and wide shoulders I’m the obvious outsider at this parade of femininity. As I rush to pull my t-shirt on, I’m painfully aware of the fact that I’m the only one lacking a lacy undergarment, and lacking a need for it. My face burns at the possibility that I’m the reason the girls turn around while changing, so as not to let an uninitiated person in on the fact that they all belong to the same sorority.
As they file out of the locker room one after the other, flaunting their new figures by swaying their not quite filled out buttocks almost imperceptibly, I fall behind and tell them I’ll catch up as I pretend to struggle with my shoe laces. With the last of these gamines gone I can finally breathe. I lock the door and pull out my pack of Marlboros, which are not a habit just yet, but rather one of the few ways of rebellion within my reach. The rest belong to the realms of science fiction. I dream of tattoos and piercings and electric blue hair as I take a drag and catch my own reflection checking me out with curiosity. I nod my greeting at her and approach the mirror.
I stand in front of the mirror and scrutinize her. Other than her boyish appearance there is not much else to distinguish her. Well, nothing with the exception of her large crooked slightly off-center nose. And while I can cope with my lack of breasts, waiting not so patiently for time to do its thing, this nose has caused me endless heartache ever since I broke it back in elementary school. I exhale the smoke into my reflection’s face and in this haze she for a second looks like my mental picture of myself: taller, sleeker, more feminine, what people think of when they say “attractive”. But the smoke clears up fast dragging me back to the ground and I’m face to face with the girl “affectionately” known as “the beak” among the guys on her block. This is the one word that paralyzes me, cripples me every time I hear it. It’s a trump card for everyone wanting to shut my wise-ass mouth. Even in zoology class I can swear I hear snickers behind me. This is the one enemy that I have not learned to fight yet. Each time I hear the word spoken I’m a nine year old kid again, sobbing in my father’s lap, asking him why I’m so ugly.
And so I examine my reflection’s nose, trying to recall what it once used to look like and what it might look like again someday, if I ever have enough money. A further look at my reflection and her hand-me-down garb assures me that my nose is here to stay for a while yet.
Nothing is quite right about this girl in the mirror with a desperate look in her eyes. I feel like I’m trapped in a foreign body, which, like my t-shirt passed down to me by an older cousin, doesn’t fit quite right. I know I’m hiding there somewhere, beneath the surface, waiting to burst out like a butterfly from its cocoon: the girl I could be, graceful, feminine, maybe even pretty; the kind of girl that isn’t talked about in adjectives such as “nice” or “smart”.
If only I could go back and tell that poor kid that things are really ok down the road, that the insecurities are gone, that she doesn’t need to hide behind her hair any more (she even ties it back these days), that she resolved the issue of not being too voluptuous on top by flaunting her legs, that she can look in the mirror and feel good about the girl she sees. All she has to do is wait. Just a little.
As they file out of the locker room one after the other, flaunting their new figures by swaying their not quite filled out buttocks almost imperceptibly, I fall behind and tell them I’ll catch up as I pretend to struggle with my shoe laces. With the last of these gamines gone I can finally breathe. I lock the door and pull out my pack of Marlboros, which are not a habit just yet, but rather one of the few ways of rebellion within my reach. The rest belong to the realms of science fiction. I dream of tattoos and piercings and electric blue hair as I take a drag and catch my own reflection checking me out with curiosity. I nod my greeting at her and approach the mirror.
I stand in front of the mirror and scrutinize her. Other than her boyish appearance there is not much else to distinguish her. Well, nothing with the exception of her large crooked slightly off-center nose. And while I can cope with my lack of breasts, waiting not so patiently for time to do its thing, this nose has caused me endless heartache ever since I broke it back in elementary school. I exhale the smoke into my reflection’s face and in this haze she for a second looks like my mental picture of myself: taller, sleeker, more feminine, what people think of when they say “attractive”. But the smoke clears up fast dragging me back to the ground and I’m face to face with the girl “affectionately” known as “the beak” among the guys on her block. This is the one word that paralyzes me, cripples me every time I hear it. It’s a trump card for everyone wanting to shut my wise-ass mouth. Even in zoology class I can swear I hear snickers behind me. This is the one enemy that I have not learned to fight yet. Each time I hear the word spoken I’m a nine year old kid again, sobbing in my father’s lap, asking him why I’m so ugly.
And so I examine my reflection’s nose, trying to recall what it once used to look like and what it might look like again someday, if I ever have enough money. A further look at my reflection and her hand-me-down garb assures me that my nose is here to stay for a while yet.
Nothing is quite right about this girl in the mirror with a desperate look in her eyes. I feel like I’m trapped in a foreign body, which, like my t-shirt passed down to me by an older cousin, doesn’t fit quite right. I know I’m hiding there somewhere, beneath the surface, waiting to burst out like a butterfly from its cocoon: the girl I could be, graceful, feminine, maybe even pretty; the kind of girl that isn’t talked about in adjectives such as “nice” or “smart”.
If only I could go back and tell that poor kid that things are really ok down the road, that the insecurities are gone, that she doesn’t need to hide behind her hair any more (she even ties it back these days), that she resolved the issue of not being too voluptuous on top by flaunting her legs, that she can look in the mirror and feel good about the girl she sees. All she has to do is wait. Just a little.