One Shy and Freaky Little Girl

Growing up, I was terribly shy. They say all that stuff usually begins at a very tender young age. And, for me, it did. The first taste of that, that I can remember, came as a result of the fact that I had extremely dry skin. My mom used to love to pull my shirt up and show her friends just how dry my skin was. This, of course, made me extremely self-conscious and had me feeling somewhat freaky. I was also the baby of the family, so, of course, I was picked on. Well, that's what all 'babies of the family' say, anyways. My sister, the middle child, had her own story. She was the invisible one. My brother, the eldest, grew up to be mama's perfect boy. Hegrew up to be a preacher. What can I say.

There were other reasons for my shyness. You know that old saying, "her mother dressed her funny?" Well, mine did.

I had to wear boys white socks, that had black and green, or black and red, or maybe black and yellow stripes running around the top. And because my mother says I was sickly, I had to wear my brothers old striped t-shirts underneath my dresses, for extra warm coverage. This only served to make me extremely hot, being so over dressed. Makes me wonder why I was sickly, could it be from sweating, from all the heat, and then going out into the cold? Add to that, I also had to wear long corduroy pants underneath my dresses, on extremly cold days. This, in the days when girls were still not allowed to wear pants to school. Now, if that did't single me out and make me look totally freaky, I don't know what did!

If that wasn't enough, my mother used to roll my hair in really tight bobby-pin curls, for picture day. The end result was some weirded out little afro, on an extremely embarrassed little white girl. Not nice... and not pretty! It was one thing when I wanted our maid to put my hair up in tiny little pigtails, all over my head, like she did her own grand-daughter's...and she did!

God rest her soul, I loved that woman. It was quite another to humiliate me with a hairdo that I didn't ask for nor care for! But, my mom had her way with me. I never forgave her for chopping my long hair off, that had gone all the way down to my waist, into a pixie cut, just because a pixie cut was all the craze, and with bangs that looked like someone had put a bowl over my head to measure them by! Those were the beginnings of my life long battle with mom, over how to wear my hair.

Another thing that made me shy was the fact that I had a childhood form of epilepsy. It was diagnosed when I was about five years old. It seems it may have been the result of having fallen on my head, when I was about two, which might explain a lot of other things, if I ever need an excuse! It was lucky, for me, that I never had a really serious form of seizures. The extent of my seizures was a fit of hyperventilation. It was scary enough, for me, as well as for anyone who might've been around me, when the hyperventilation began. It never happened, often, in public, just enough to separate me, yet again, into some freaky space. All eyes upon me, staring in amazement, as I struggled to catch my breath. I was forced to take heavy barbituates, which made me nauseated. It might also explain why I had a hard time getting out of bed, in the mornings. These days, I have hanging, in my work cubicle, a little picture of Garfield, dressed in a warm night shirt, wearing big fluffy slippers and donning a night cap, sipping on a steaming cup of coffee, "If people were meant to pop out of bed, we'd all sleep in toasters!" I love and adore coffee! And thank you, Garfield!

My type of epilepsy I was diagnosed was grand mal, which doesn't make sense, to me, because grand mal is suppose to be one of the worse strains. But, I never had actual convulsions. And, I wonder if a doctor was to examine my charts, today, if he would diagnose me with the same disorder. Nevertheless, I'll never forgot the horror of the time I was riding home from school, on the bus, and it was my stop, time to get off. For some unexplainable reason, that still remains a mystery, to this day, I was hallucinating. I must've been in a daze, to say the very least. I don't know if it was caused by the epilepsy, the drugs, or what, exactly. I guess I will never know. But, it was another embarrassing moment. As I was making my way down the aisle of the bus, I saw, on the floor, what appeared to be a big, huge pile of fluffy shredded paper. It must've been at least a foot high. I thought it looked so neat. It never occured to me to wonder why in the world it would be in the middle of the aisle, on the floor of the school bus. All I knew was that I wanted to put my foot down right smack dab in the middle of that big fluffy pile of shredded paper. In my child's mind, it had the same enticing effect as one might have to putting their foot down in the middle of a huge pile of freshly raked leaves. I grew closer to the pile, raised my foot high, then down my foot went... but, instead of all the fun, joy, and delight that I had thought it would be, instead, I was awakened from the daze, from that hallucination, to the uproar of laughter all around me. I looked down, and found that I had just plopped my foot down into a big pile of vomit! Oh, my god! What had I done???... and why??? Oh, yuk!

In recollection, I can see and hear everyone trying to tell me to, "Watch out! Be careful! Don't step in that puke!" For whatever reason, those voices had a muzzled affect and I was not able to understand what they had been trying to tell me, until I had awakened from that strange state that I had found myself in. It was their extreme revulsion and laughter, at what I had just done, that had awakened me from that state... and in that exact moment, and only then, did I finally 'hear' what they had been trying to warn me of, and realize just what I had done. By then, it was too late. I had no explaination, that I could give them, for why I did such a stupid thing. It seems I remember mumbling something about thinking it was a big pile of shredded paper, but all that received was more laughter. I didn't know, myself, or even begin to understand what had just happened. I would forget about that day, and not remember it again, for a very, very long time, until just a few years ago.

Well, there I was, in school, wearing freaky clothes and sporting even freakier hair, running along, hyperventilating, stepping in puke, and suffering with that extremely dry skin. My hands were so dry, in the winter, that my knuckles would crack and bleed. We tried everything! I carried a little pink bottle of Ponds, or a little white bottle of Jergens to school, with me, but still they would crack and bleed. One of the most damaging moments of my life came when it was time to play some outdoor game, at recess, that required standing in a circle and holding hands. Red Rover comes to mind, but I'm not sure you stand in a circle for Red Rover. Anyways, I'd never been so humiliated (this was pre-puke incident) as when the cutest boy, in all of 2nd grade, went, "eeeyeeew", when he had to hold my cracked and bleeding hand. I probably turned every shade of red on the chart, and I wished to disappear. Regardless of the incident, I was in love with him all through grade school. When I was in the 6th grade, a friend talked me into writing him a love letter. I don't know what possessed me to follow her advice, but she seemed sincere, and I did. He did write me back, he said sweet things, and he let me down gently, telling me that he already had a girlfriend. That very gentle letting down seemed to make up for the damage my Heart had felt before. Isn't life strange, a turn of the page. See Moody Blues.

For whatever reason, the hand thing would continue to keep playing out, over the years. By the time I had reached junior high, they were under control. At least the cracking part, because I had learned to grease them up, pretty well. One day, at school, this 'other' really cute guy was showing out, being all debonair, taking the girl's hands, bowing down and kissing them. There I was, this still very shy young girl, my hand in his, his lips upon my hand, when, all of a sudden, out of his mouth came the same exact sound that I had heard, in second grade, and producing, within me, the same exact emotional effect. There came another, "eeeyeeew," from yet another cute boy! This time, there were no bleeding knuckles, but he was disgusted, all the same, from the thick coating of vaseline intensive care that I managed to slather upon my hands, and that had reached his discriminate lips. I had forgotten all about the humiliating moment, in second grade, and here were those same emotions, surfacing, bringing it all back, again.

Twice, more, in my lifetime, I would hear negative/freaky things about my hands. Once, one of my very own best friends had oooohed and aaaaahed about the texture of the palm of my hands. He was amazed at the vast number, and depth, of the lines. He was freaking out, asking me to flex them outward, so that he could see the lines turn red, making the lines stand out all the more. The last time someone freaked over my hands, I was a cashier in a grocery store. I was busy, on the cash register, checking out someone's groceries, when out of nowhere, the woman asks, in an astounded tone, "oh, my god, what happened to your hands???" I was like, "What?" I truly did not know what she meant. She was like, "Your hands! What happened to them? Were they burned in a fire?" Well, by then, I was 19 years old and I'd come a long ways, even if I was shocked and surprised at her words. I simply told her, "No, they weren't burned in a fire, this is just the way my hands look." It was my turn to see someone else feel embarrassed, about my hands, instead of me, as she tried to find a way to gracefully back out of her stupdity.

Since all those times, of long ago, I've had extremely different reactions to my apparenty unusual hands. Since those times, I've had people tell me that my hands have character. I've actually had people tell me that they just loves my hands! I've had people tell me that my hands are beautiful! And I've had people tell me that I have very loving hands, that I do gentle things with them, like sweeping away a stray hair, from another one's face. Maybe my experience, with my own hands, is why I am attracted to a particularly strong strain of character in some hands.

They say that time will sometimes bring justice. One of the greatest moments of justice, for myself, came when I ran into an old friend, from my high school dating years. She was a couple of years older than myself, and 'experienced'. She was a great tease, with the boys. Her method of birth control was to wear holey underpants. She knew that if she wore panties that had holes in them that she would be too embarrassed to get naked and go all the way. I learned how to smoke and drink, with her, and everywhere we went, she was the one who got the cute guy. She must've had a hundred different colors of halter tops with matching hip hugger jeans. And even though she was somewhat large, in stature, she had an extremely flat stomach and always had a great tan. It was those halter tops and jeans, and tanned tummy, that always got the guys. I wss the shy one, who usually went out with the cute guys friend, on our double dates. Anyways, when I was in my thirties, married and with two children, I ran into her, after not having seen her for probably 10 or 15 years. She was shocked and amazed. "I can't believe it! You haven't aged a bit, you look just as young as you did, when were kids." To add to that, she said, "I used to always feel so sorry for you, because you had such dry skin. I used to think, 'poor thing, she's gonna age so fast,' and you still look so young!" I never knew that she had felt that way, and I thought it was pretty tacky of her to tell me that then, after all the sometimes unattractive guys that she had set me up with, on those double dates. Well, as it turns out, I was a late bloomer. And, after two children, I was looking much finer than I did, back then. And her? She had gained a ton of weight. Gone were the halter tops and hip huggers, gone was the tan. She was no longer the hot little teaser, who had managed to snag all the cuter boys.