pretty ugly

i would be lying if i said i didn't think i was pretty.  people tell me that, always have, and often i look into the mirror and i see a woman with nicely balanced features, decent skin, good hair, and not-too-fucked-up teeth.  i see a slim figure, needing work in a few places, but pleasant and attractive nonetheless.

it's odd then, that when i see my self, i only see ugly.

it's not the looks, per se.  and it's not the soul, either, as i think that aside from some pretty stupid choices in my 20's, i'm a fairly decent person.  in fact, i ponder deeply matters of the heart, my own conflicted one especially, and i do my best to be kind and caring, even though i don't always do it right.  i'm a good listener, i don't steal, and i truly appreciate folks from all walks of life.

still, there is a breakdown somewhere.  i suspect it is in the foundation of me, the beginnings of life vandalized and spat upon.  i can hear my mothers hateful voice telling me how plain and homely i am, ridiculing me in front of people, conflicting with my grandmothers insistence that i am pretty, pushing that competitive, hairsprayed, beauty queen brand of 'beauty'.  but that's not what confuses me the most.  it's the seedy eyes, the man in my house who salivated over my young body as a child, fondling me through my clothes right there in the middle of everything, my mother never noticing, never caring.  the watching of my hips spreading with puberty, my tiny breasts forming under a training bra, and the moving me closer to him as he had an erection next to me on the living room couch.  to this day, it makes me feel sick, nauseated, and knowing that it was the pretty that attracted him to me, his stepdaughter, that makes me wish to cast if off of me, as far as possible, throw it away in favor of breakouts and glasses and a shaved head.  because pretty makes me a target, puts me in danger.

it used to be the zits on my face.  oh, i covered them up with pounds of makeup alright, but i couldn't help but to pick, pick, pick, making the acne worsen and redden, puffing up my face until it hurt.  and from there, it was the chest, the breast area especially, and then the neck and shoulders, admittedly my best physical features.  now i've moved down to the legs, pregnancy hormones having cleared up my face and breast profoundly.  and for this, i should be happy, but instead i continue to obsessively seek out all the ugly i can find on me.

perhaps i do it because it is a problem i can sort of control, little tiny purges i can attack anywhere, at anytime.  perhaps it distracts me from the bigger problems, the ones out of my reach, the ones that if i sat with them long enough might destroy me, might suffocate me with their unresolvedness.  perhaps it is to keep me ugly on a physical level, so that i might feel safer, secure in my repugnant body, certain no stranger would want to touch me.

intellectually, i can acknowledge this as a real issue, and the solution is to just stop doing it.  to accept my self as i am, pretty or ugly, but to be uncompromisingly me.  and the even bigger issue would be to give myself over to the beauty that is sublime, to give the most beautiful part of myself to the man i love, as he has loved me through it all, zitted and bald, scared and bitter.  still i find ways to put a barrier between us, yet he remains ever faithful and committed to loving me, no matter what.

we'll marry soon.  i hope i can let this go by then, so that i can vow to give him the best of me now, and to mean it and follow through.  i hope i can learn to see me through his eyes, to love myself with tenderness and patience.  it's the least i can do for the one who brings such beauty to my world, who has blessed me with not only his presence, his home, his art, and his soul, but now with the most precious gift, our son.  i hope i can let go of the rest of my ugly, and learn to trust, and remember how to love, and to begin to live in beauty.