Growing up I loved shorts, jeans, tee shirts, and sneakers. Combs were the bane of my existence, and makeup was something my mom put on when she was trying to impress. My looks were secondary to everything. I cared more about the thoughts in my head and the books I carried around like a security blanket. My mother often despaired and was often exasperated by my refusal to play the role of an ordinary girl. My decision to attend my senior prom spurred her into taking me shopping immediately.
When I went to college my mother saw the state of my closet and went shopping. Unable to allow me, her daughter, to wear a series of graphic print tee shirts and the same five pairs of jeans. I was never the girl who cared about the brands, the names, the style I wore. It just was not something I thought needed that much thought.
Insecurity did not strike me until I was older. I started to question myself and the way I presented myself only when I went to law school. There I was, this girl who had spent her life working towards a goal, and not knowing what to do with herself now that she achieved it. I wasn't prepared for quiet that level of adulthood. The thing I feel that people do not say enough is that there is not specific moment when you are in possession of all the answers.
That first year I met people who were at the same level at me, while also being light years ahead of me. Most of them had lived their lives before attending school. They had worked in the public and the private sector. Nothing they did to me, made me question myself, but being there. Listening to them talk about their travels, their past lives as workers or business owners, and seeing how confident they were on the path they were taking made me stumble.
I wasn't in Kansas anymore. I was in the big leagues, and thinking I was still in the stands being a spectator. At what should have been the confirmation of my ability to succeed, I was suddenly looking in the mirror and not seeing someone who was enough... Pretty enough. Thin enough. Lady enough.
I started taking more care with the clothes that I wore and leaned to really apply makeup. I did more with my hair then just combing it into a crown braid. I started and limited the time I spend wearing heels. I started smiling less and feeling less comfortable in my own body. I was finally becoming the woman my mother wanted to be and losing the part of myself who cared little about what others thought. And just enjoyed being me.
Eventually maintaining the superficial façade of confidence wore on me and I started to crave for the carefree way I lived before. So I made a change. Something I am typically resistant to, but otherwise happy to do when it meant I could go back to not having to spend hours in front of a mirror. Or worrying about whether I packed my pressed powder.
I stopped looking at other woman and thinking that I should be like them. I stopped comparing myself to those around me who looked like they stepped out of a magazine. I started doing what was fun again. Wearing the clothes I found to be comfortable and just putting a dash of color on my lips. I realized that the me I liked the most, was the me who laughed because she remembered the time she fell on her ass while heading to class. Or the time she slid down a dirt hill after the perfect first day of her sophomore year of high school, lowering her cool cred by at least five points.
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