Dear 13 yr. old Self,

Hey! I was driving back from Raleigh to Sanford last night and listening to Nirvana and thought of you. Because it’s October and all the trees are changing colors, I remembered how much you liked the view from your bedroom window and I sort of wanted to join you there and scribble some more in that red plaid journal you keep in your bedside table.

Anyway, I thought that, because I’m twice as old as you are, I thought it’d be fitting to at least touch base with you where you are at that ever-so-pivotal and formative era and compare notes. (Oh, don’t get weary of hearing all about the elusive mystery of adolescence just yet because it honestly never ends. Seriously. Scores of people are obsessed with the “coming of age” years, even beyond John Hughes.) However, because we’ve both seen “Back to the Future” a million times, I’m sure you understand why I can’t start doling out advice or telling you how things are going to be 13 years down the road. Unlike when Doc came to tell Marty that his son was in trouble, I’m keeping my mouth shut because I’m rather pleased with the way things are in 2009 and I don’t want to say anything that might screw it all up. (I know! “2009″ sounds totally weird, right?)

Don’t get me wrong, though. There’s a massive pile of stuff I want to at least warn you about or try to advise you to do differently because, you know, experiencing heartrending pain isn’t fun. (You might’ve noticed.) It’s kind of like being a mother to a child and wanting that child to turn out to be really well-rounded and competent and socially adept and strong but knowing that she’s going to have to deal with and weather a lot of bullshit before she gets to that point. It’s all imperative to growth but it sucks to have to walk through together.

And that’s the point of me writing to you is to tell you that I’m here. I don’t mean to ostracize you or make you feel ignorant by saying, “You’ll understand this more when you get older” but I know you’re smart enough to get that I’m not intentionally being insulting. Please know that there’s nothing you’re feeling right now that I don’t fully understand. I get it. I’ve seen and remember all of it. I know the reasons you think you’re crappy and why you hate certain people and how you feel about certain things and I know that sort of omniscience from me is annoying but I just want you to know that I’m on board with all that. And I love you anyway.

No, I really do. And not in the way that mothers love their children because they have to or how people choose to love people because they’re settling. I really, honestly love you. And I think you’re pretty amazing, actually.

Yes, okay, you’re incredibly awkward-looking and you have no idea what you’re doing sartorially. (Those get better with time - the former slightly more than the latter - but just be thankful for that amazing rack you have. It’s pretty amazing for an 18 yr. old, let alone a 7th grader. And you didn’t have to pray a single day for it, right? Give thanks.) And, yes, you’re painfully insecure, which causes you to be horrible to people you feel threatened by. And you’re culturally inept and things with your parents have just started getting interesting and you’re often that weird girl who talks about sex or left-wing politics too much and you’re confined to those god-awful braces for another year and there hasn’t been a single male human who’s shown any interest in you since the 4th grade and you have to ride around in that giant bus your mom drives around and you have a deeper voice and more facial hair than anyone else in your class and you’re madly in love with someone who will never ever love you back and you only have enough money for a pair of Arizona jeans and some cK One knockoff fragrance for your autumn wardrobe… I get it. You’re tragically, unforgivably flawed and your first years as a pre-adult are not anywhere close to what you were hoping.

Let me clue you in on something that I don’t think will hurt your natural progression: Every single person your age feels exactly the same way you do. Every single one. Even those cocky douchebags who have throngs of girlfriends and torment you daily are freaking out on the inside about how tragically flawed they are, too. I swear. And here’s the real kicker, ready? This whole self-centered mentality is going to continue for at least another 4-6 years with those people you’re around. Seriously! I know you’re positive that all anyone’s thinking of is how much you suck every time you walk into a room and it’s easy to believe that when you’re constantly being reminded by idiots around you that they think you suck. Here’s the thing [that I'm hoping you'll believe because it's me you're talking to here instead of some adult who couldn't know what they're talking about because they don't know what it's like to be you]: everyone is so busy freaking out that everyone else is going to notice how much they suck that they try to hurl the negative attention onto someone else preemptively. And, because you’re the one who’s always had good grades and a loud mouth, you’re the top candidate at the moment. Apparently, you’re pretty intimidating. Good work! (If you want proof of this, wait until one of those little shitheads tries to embarrass you by loudly calling you a “dyke” again and then ask them how many times they’ve jerked off to two girls going at it. If you throw in a wink at the end, I guarantee they’ll have no immediate response.)

Just, above anything else, remember that those people who think that “these are the best years of your life” are the people who have done nothing exciting or of value since they were 18. And in Adult World [that lasts way longer than jr. & sr. high put together], those people suck.

I know. I know. It doesn’t matter who you’re hearing this stuff from; it can’t change how you actually feel about it and deal with it, even if the person telling you all this knows everysinglething about you. It’s cool. I’m not taking it personally.

I’ll spare you any more lectures and, no, I’m still not giving up any secrets. I will tell you that things get a little better for a while, then interesting and fun, then bad, then fun and bad with a little good, then kinda bad but you don’t really notice because you’re still having fun, then very very very dark and then awful and then completely intolerable (literally) and then, just when you’re positive it’s always going to be awful because it has been gradually so since right around now, it gets really unbelievably, incredibly, amazingly wonderful and it stays that way for longer than you can remember. I promise.

So that’s what you have to look forward to. And I wanted you to know so that, during these next 13 years, you’ll keep a glimmer of hope in your heart to keep yourself moving forward. I know you’ll disagree with me, but I believe you’re better than all that crap you’re grappling with right now and I know you’ll figure out how to get rid of it over time.

I do love you. And I think you’re exactly where and who you should be right now. Trust me on this one.

Much love and light,

Mrs.* Castallare

*

In the last two years since Greg and I were hurled into parenthood, we’ve seen an unusual amount of irrefutable blessings laid out for us to ease us into such a dramatic lifestyle change. It seems that at every turn, God has gone out of the way to plant opportunities and happy accidents at our doorstep. I’m not saying it’s all been stress-free and devoid of any difficulties, (my last month’s worth of entries should prove that) but many many bridges have materialized before us that we stubbornly refuse to accredit to coincidence.

Oh, for example? Okay, we found out we were pregnant during the last week of our undergrad classes. We graduated the following Friday and the very next Monday Greg started work as an art director for a local promotions company. When that business announced they were going out of business, Greg was given an interview for a far better job the very next day (where he’s currently employed.)

What else? All of our baby clothes, furniture, general accoutrement has been free so far, due to the generous gifts and hand-me-downs from friends and family. And - because it should never be taken as granted - my pregnancy was completely flawless. There were natural pains and other symptoms, but I never ran into any difficulties and we never had any scares regarding the baby’s health. 

Not enough? We found our first apartment to be ideal although it was the first and only one we looked at. The house we’re living in presently is even nicer and the rent is far less expensive per month than others of the same or lesser quality. 

And, even though I’ve said it ad nauseum, all the components regarding our wedding, wedding day, wedding week came together seamlessly. Every person we hired was above and beyond expectations, the weather was perfect for our ceremony, we got an insane deal on the cottage we rented… 

So yeah, I’m confident in admitting that we’ve been incredibly blessed in the last few years and that this gives us an unbelievable amount of hope and optimism about our lives together. And every time we receive another unexpected gift from Spirit, I am humbled and convinced that this has to be the end of our streak of good luck. 

And then this week we received perhaps the most incredible opportunity either of us [or anyone else that we know] has ever encountered. (I hate that I can’t expose this new miracle at the moment, but there are many many factors weighing in escrow at the moment.  I’ve run into complications from running my mouth publicly before and am not about to risk screwing this up just to prattle to my blog readers. Um, no offense.) Not only is this gift a relative luxury (in that it’s not essential to our well-being or survival) but it creates opportunities and a sense of momentum toward our long-ignored ambitions that might otherwise have been unobtainable right now. This gift stands out as not only a massive benefit to our lives, but almost as though God is winking at us and giving us permission to chase after our dreams without any more hesitation. 

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I once dated an arrogant, angry Atheist man (actually, that pretty much describes every male, American atheist) who was intent on convincing me that miracles were simply happenings that we didn’t yet have the science to explain. Calm and unwavering in my convictions, I watched him become frantic with frustration and this inherent need of his to cram his beliefs down my throat (something he - and every other atheist of his description/demographic - claim to despise so much about Christians) and I could see his respect for me deteriorating as I refused to listen to his logic-based arguments. Confidently, I told him I’d seen too many miracles to even bother considering that they weren’t evidence of a Higher Power with great intentions for me. After describing my personal examples, I frankly stated that I would be a complete fool to create excuses for these events in which God had taken the time to make himself and his benevolence obvious to me. 

“That’s ridiculous.” He huffed like a child being denied a pointless new toy. “I mean, how many miracles have you seen?”

Involuntarily, a slightly-condescending smirk slinked across my lips. “Well, for Christ’s sake. How many do you need?”

If something massively life-changing falls on your lap that could pretty much turn your whole current lifestyle on its ear, it’s okay to be totally terrified for a few minutes, right?

I mean… Excited? Obviously…  But freaking out intensely on the inside? Is that okay?

(It’s actually pretty huge and very exciting but I’m not going to say anything until we’ve made up our minds. We’ll be spending a lot of time exploring our new option further, but it would render a pretty massive change so I do promise to follow up.)

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My new medication does this thing where my brain creates these crunch noises between my ears and just where my neck meets my skull. I can really only feel/hear them at night and they remind me of waves surging against the inside of my head. I wrote a little haiku to acknowledge them:

Waves crash inside my

Skull, and I can’t tell if they’re

Clear blue or thick black

I think I’ll name it “It’s All About Lighting, I Guess.”

G’night everybody!

I am frustrated.

And what’s even worse than that is that I am really really pissed at myself for being frustrated.

And, what’s more, I’m unbelievably ashamed at my actions and for even taking the time and effort to have the aforementioned emotions. 

And, most of all, I’m embarrassed at my audacity and complete lack of humility and my shameless, chronic need to give/force my opinion (whether it’s right or not) to everysingleperson in my life. 

So here’s the backstory. In brief. In attempting a peaceful friendship with a man with whom I was once romantically involved, I’ve been able, up until now, to detach myself completely from what is going on in his personal life, including his love life. The knowledge that none of his actions in either aspect of his life no longer had anything to do with me personally was incredibly liberating and I found myself able to step back and watch objectively, without judgment, and only offering an opinion when asked for one and, even then, being able to give an emotionally-detached, unbiased opinion. 

Healthy, right?

But somewhere down the line, I started tampering with fire a little too hard, feeling old frustrations with this man and his actions creeping up that I laid to rest years upon years ago. Suddenly I am passionately pleading with him to consider how his flighty decisions really affect these women he adamantly claims to care about. I am trying to illustrate to him that, while his motivations are different this time around, his actions and habits haven’t budged at all. Mostly, though, I’m still trying to get him to understand that his continual misuse of the word “love” has caused people that trust him with their hearts to believe that he has absolutely no idea what this word means and has no value on the act of sputtering it out. 

And last night, for the first time in years, I lay awake feeling my frustrations and powerlessness toward this one specific man building inside of me, despite my constant attempts to redirect my thoughts and get the fuck over it. I mean, for Christ’s sake, at least in the past this had something to do with me and my personal life, but right now it absolutely does not. 

I know this is my fault. I knew the exact specifications of this man’s character when I agreed to attempt a relationship with him and I knew that, after years of begging him to hear me, I was never going to get through no matter how much time and energy and emotion I put into trying. I really thought that I’d accepted that.

What’s ironic about this situation is that I’ve spent so much time trying to get him to see that his redundant behavior is hurtful and fruitless, I’ve failed to see that I’m engaging in the exact same thing. I’ve spent the better part of a decade trying to get through to this man about these exact issues and I know deep in my heart that me nor anyone else is going to be able to convince him otherwise. I’ve known this for years, in fact. I spent many years after I realized this fact still pressing on, knowing that my efforts would always be fruitless. There is great shame on me for doing it all over again, no matter the good intentions I’ve always had. And I’m even more ashamed because this man has only listened to me and my emotional diatribes, without calling me on my inappropriate involvement and asking me to back the fuck off and let him live his life for a change. 

Insanity is repeating the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

This is why I am livid with myself. Not only did I break a promise to myself that I would never waste so much time and energy being frustrated and trying to change this man’s views, but, in doing so, I am being incredibly unfair to my husband and family. If my husband was spending nights awake in agitation about his former lover’s current habits and love life, I would be more devastated and hurt than I can fathom. In spending time on this, I am betraying the love and devotion I have to my husband both as a lover and as a friend and, for that, I am incredibly ashamed. 

The other thing that adds to this frustration is the inherent knowledge that, as per habit, this whole emotional crisis is of no concern to anyone else, including this man involved. Naturally this reiterates the glaring fact that this whole inner struggle and sleepless concern is completely pointless and a massive waste of time and energy in general. This, also, hurts very badly in its intense familiarity. 

Because ultimately, it doesn’t matter how this man conducts himself in regards to my reality. While I have a tendency to get emotionally involved out of having experienced this man’s habits, they no longer apply to me, my life, my character, my personality whatsoever. And really, they never actually did in the first place. Although you couldn’t have convinced me in the past, this man’s repeated betrayal of my trust, denial of my love, conditional emotions, ever-straying affections never for a moment had anything to do with me. Or really, any other woman with whom he’s had emotional ties. I know this with every fiber of my being, without so much as a glimmer of doubt… or grief anymore. I learned this many years ago as I began working on my own recovery and it was this knowledge that lead me to believe I could carry on a platonic relationship with this man, safe in the knowledge that his actions couldn’t hurt my sense of self-worth anymore. This was simply something I’d learned to accept in any relationship I had with this man, whether romantic or otherwise. I was genuinely okay with that. 

So shame on me for crossing the line [yet again]. I am so embarrassed to have let myself become so emotionally involved with this ancient problem of mine [yet again], and even more mortified and ashamed because this time, it could not be less of my business to start with. This man actually never asked for this, he only rarely asked for my input and opinions and I should have left it at that, unbiased, detached, focused on my own life, just like any other platonic relationship on the globe. This is me having to meddle, having to try to fix everything and everyone, having to have control over everything I can. This is typical alcoholic behavior if I’ve ever seen it and I am having to force myself to forgive and forget this slip-up and move on. 

As a friend (or someone who’s honestly trying to be just that), my emotional opinion is neither relevant nor appropriate. My emotional arguments are unwarranted and inexcusable and my inherent need to try to change people is a flaw that has run more than one friend off. As a friend, my only role is to listen, give support when asked for it, accept my friend’s shortcomings for what they are, perhaps be a little grateful that my romantic life no longer resembles this sort of ongoing drama, and stop myself right there. Anything else is unfair to pretty much everyone involved, including myself. 

So, it looks like today I’m having to start over again. I’ve got to stop feeling sorry for my own stupid mistakes and start working to be a functional, sane friend to everyone who chooses to give me that title. 

Dammit. Why can’t I just function like a normal, emotionally-harnessed person for one time in my life? Would it kill me to not shamelessly, unabashedly fling myself and my emotions into every possible situation for one effing time? You’d think I’d have learned by now.

I have two ex boyfriends that, somehow, I have found the mental peace and inner stability required to call them my friends.

…No, seriously… Like, real friends. Not just I’m-just-being-polite-because-I-don’t-want-anymore-drama-but-I-secretly-still-loathe-you friend.

The first of these two is a man in which I engaged in a brief but passionate affair with while I was studying abroad and continued after a strange, hurtful break when he came to visit me at my home in the United States. He still calls me every month to engage in hours-long conversations in which we discuss our lives, our plans, and our general opinions on life, love, happiness, etc. The second is a man that I experienced the single most tumultuous, agonizingly drawn-out, painful relationship one could fathom for the bulk of my teenage-through-early-20’s career. These days we’re able to sit across a table together and discuss, without animosity or residual resentment, the goings-on of our personal lives and the vast changes we’ve seen in our lives since we parted ways. And yes, the fact that I am able to maintain these sorts of relationships in a healthy forum is staggering to me.

Without the former trappings of passionate emotional attachment, we are able to return to that place where we can enjoy the company of the other and the very characteristics that attracted us to the other in the first place. From this distance, I am able to observe the successes and failures of their personal lives without any of the anger, jealousy, frustrations and other personal damages I would’ve inevitably felt when their lives were shared with my own. While I’m able to empathize or sympathize with their particular situations, the freedom of not taking anything about their actions personally is incredibly liberating, especially when compared to the dynamic of the love affairs we conducted previously.

Alright, admittedly I’m always prone to wanting to share my general opinions on their behaviors, situations, lifestyles, choices, etc. However, instead of the relentless nagging I tend toward in my desire to change and remedy the situation, I’m more able to step back and lend my advice/perspective without disgust or disdain or even judgment to their characters. Having experienced and forgiven the human flaws they naturally carry through the intimacy of a romantic relationship, I’m free to observe and react from the perspective of someone who is familiar with their habits.

Man, that’s a nice change. What a friggin’ relief.

Me, however… I’m one of those neurotic types who has to have answers and closure and the comfort of wrapping everything that may potentially be left-over or unresolved up in a great big bow. So, embarrassingly, I’m compelled to poke and prod around through their psyche, pestering them with questions regarding their motives and feelings and all sorts of other incidental bullshit that genuinely doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things and certainly doesn’t usually exist between old friends.

Neither of these men have ever turned the tables on me to inquire into the depths of my mind, which I more or less attributed to their histories of lack of interest in me or learning about my inner self (this goes back to my ever-present desire to be with someone who longed to know everything there ever was to know about me. I’ve talked about it. No need to rehash.), but one of the two, when asked, was quick to respond that he was genuinely just happy to get to talk to me again after all the bullshit that obstructed our communication for so long. Perhaps my personal exposure would come forward as we built more comfort and confidence in this foreign new relationship, but he wasn’t willing to risk any more altercations in order to probe with pointed questions. Hunh.

Mostly, though, these relationships have provided me with some of the most rewarding compliments and reassurance of my character of my life. With the understanding that there’s no need for manipulative tactics or glossing over personal faults in the typical traditions of seduction or romantic pursuit, real honesty can freely come forward regarding our feelings and opinions of the other without fear of rejection or sleeping alone. And, in that, I’ve learned a lot about the attractiveness of my company, the joy others find in conversations with me, even when there’s absolutely nothing to gain from interacting with me. Knowing that compliments and flattery have no personal benefit for these men when addressed to me, they still take the time to slide a genuine one in from time-to-time, which carry far more weight than any they may have uttered when we were romantically involved.

So yeah. In a shocking change of mind and events, taking the time to heal and befriend my exes has been far more rewarding than I ever could have predicted. I’m glad I took the time to heal and forgive on my own, but these friendships have instilled in me a great amount of confidence in my ability to forgive and let go. Which, as you may have noticed, have always been giant obstacles of mine.

Naturally, while my husband is supportive of any forward movement that allows me to heal and grow, he’s not necessarily welcoming any former lovers into our home anytime soon. These exes will always remain exes to him, and thus, will only be able to be friends who sit at my periphery. And frankly, I’m perfectly okay with that. I’m always afraid that anything closer would enable the flammability of those relationships that I’ve been burned by far too many times already. Even though I have confidence in the motives and intentions of both men, it’s better to keep these relationships at a safe distance from myself, my life, and my family to negate any possible risk of hurting the life I’m presently submerged in and quite happy with. These are things I consciously know but, of course, aren’t rehashed or even discussed much, as though we’ve just accepted that these salvaged relationships are only able to survive when contained in a surrealistic realm. But then, I try not to waste time pondering the small tragedy of this circumstance, lest I find myself engaging in more drama… which negates the entire purpose in the first place… so forget I said anything.

Okay, so I’m rambling. The point is, I’m genuinely surprised at how happy I feel with the peaceful friendships I’m able to share with these men and, even moreso, the rewards and benefits I’ve received from these relationships. It’s pretty amazing, actually.

(NOTE: This is NOT a plea for reassuring compliments. Any such commentary will be immediately deleted.)

I’ve never thought I was attractive. I mean that. I don’t mean “I’ve never thought I was beautiful.” or “I hate the way I look.” I just mean that I don’t consider myself to be an aesthetically attractive person. And I’ve sort of come to peace with that. 

Don’t get me wrong; I have days where I think I look better than usual. I felt that way on my wedding day, once during a Spring Festival Court I was nominated to in high school, once during a photo shoot north of Cairns in Australia. But these days are few and far between and seem to feel like breaks from my usual visual self.

It hasn’t always been that way, of course. In my early teens I was at the tail-end of early-adolescent-awkward-glasses-and-braces-hideousness and chose to ignore my appearance altogether, often dressing for utilitarian purposes and avoiding interactions with my mirror at all. Later in my high school experience, I was encouraged to explore my appearance as I was attending an arts school for theatre and an actor’s main tool is his/her body, so it was imperative that I looked at myself objectively.

When I looked, I saw the same thing I see now; a slightly overweight, average-looking girl next door. She wasn’t particularly unattractive, but she certainly wasn’t one of those women who would turn heads in hallways and on city streets. She was an under-the-radar mediocre and, as an actor, that should have been enough to work with. 

(This idea, by the way, was the basis of my relentless Low Self Esteem [LSE] and resulted in years upon years of allowing emotional abuse in exchange for the male attention I desperately craved. This, of course, is something I’m sick of talking/thinking about and is way way too cliche for my demographic, so we’re going to tactfully gloss over that entire aspect of my struggle with LSE so as not to make this another one of “those blogs”. You’re welcome. [insert smile here])

But naturally, as with most things in my late teenage years, I rebelled against this notion of mediocrity, grappling for a visual identity in a plethora of sartorial identities and never feeling a resonance with any of them. Eventually, I began hiding out in androgynous looks, wearing cargo pants and shapeless sweaters everywhere. This escapist look carried me into my college years and, although I took a few risks here-and-there, I always treated these bold new looks as crazy experiments, not suitable of someone like myself. I would love to resort to outlandish outfits with melodramatic zeal,  in hopes that everyone else would get the evident joke that I was desperately trying to make: I get that I’m not hot enough to pull this look off; it’s irony, people! 

The looks became increasingly bolder and, in my early twenties I found myself hiding out in them every single time I felt uncomfortable in my own skin on a public level. (Which, when added to my social anxiety was A LOT.) When I wasn’t hiding out in baggy, nondescript clothing, I was hurdling myself to the other extreme, going over the top with “looks”, coating on dramatic makeup and putting on airs like it was all just an act that everyone was in on. 

Not only this, I started obsessing about my appearance, taking photos of myself on a daily basis and plastering Photoshopped/retouched images all over internet forums and networking sites, practically begging for the confirmation and adulation I desperately wanted. I was never comfortable completely exploiting myself (unless I was annihilated/inebriated/drunkbeyondreason, of course. Then all bets were off.) but I was prone to narcissism to an embarrassing degree, all in hopes that I could quiet the resounding knowledge that I was average-looking. Somehow, seeking attention and compliments translated to happiness and comfort in my appearance in my messed-up thinking and I was a junkie for it, no matter the source. And all the while I knew that it was all entirely driven out of the fear that I wasn’t any sort of notable beauty, that I wasn’t one of those people who would ever command attention from her looks, and, mostly, that this aesthetic mediocrity was what made me worthless as a human being.   

When I met my husband, I was at my heaviest weight ever and had made a lifestyle of sobriety, which included a new modesty in my appearance. I’d dealt with my social anxieties enough to feel comfortable being seen in public, but I didn’t do much to call attention to myself and I had finally begun to settle into accepting what I really looked like. After years of obsessing about my appearance and my supposedly obvious flaws, I was taking the time to focus on my strengths and accepting my body as the vehicle it was designed to be. I started shirking away from cameras, not calling attention to myself through outlandish attire anymore but focusing on the things that were unique and attractive about myself. I started bellydancing and kayaking and going out to do karaoke with friends and finally not worrying about how I looked doing any of it. 

Now, I’m about the same. I’ve dropped a significant amount of weight since before I was pregnant, which lends itself to easier shopping and general movement, but I’ve finally resolved myself to the fact that I may never be a striking beauty that people whisper about and envy and that’s alright with me. My whole life I prayed for a significant other who would tell me I’m beautiful every day (I even argued constantly with one of my exes because he would rarely dole out compliments… sigh...), and today I have a husband who does just that, even when I was at my most pregnant or my heaviest in post-pregnancy or when I’m at my most disgusting in the early morning or when I’m a sniffling, coughing, snotty mess. Although it’s a completely new concept for me, not caring about how I look but knowing that I do visually please my partner is a welcome relief from my old habits. I still dodge his camera lens when I can, but I take a lot of comfort knowing that the weight of my old low self-esteem is being helped along by someone who loves me. 

But my focus isn’t entirely off aesthetics altogether. I’ve now become obsessed with the beauty in my daughter, often gazing at her for hours and admiring her perfect skin and puffy cheeks and wispy blonde hair and devastating blue eyes.  I love her pudgy thighs and tiny toes and pointy ears and crooked teeth with more enthusiasm than I ever loved any teenage crush.

And yes, I’m fully aware that she’s not what most people would classify as the epitome of beauty. I’ve honestly never cared less about those sort of societal standards in my life. I’m perfectly happy moving the spotlight to her, turning the attention from myself to her on every possible occasion I get, plastering images of her to show off to friends and family. For the first time ever, I show off these sort of images without a care in the world as to the responses they garner. I beam at the compliments she receives but they don’t affect me in any way after my smile ends. I am certain that if she never received another compliment about her appearance for the rest of her life, I would never find her any less beautiful.

I’ll admit it’s a strange way to find confidence despite the opinions of others, but I genuinely can’t think of a better way to learn such an important lesson.