Well That Didn't Work

HAVE YOU EVER NOT RECOGNIZED YOURSELF?
Walking to class this morning, I caught a glimpse of myself in the glass of a trophy case out of the corner of my eye. I walking backwards a few steps and made eye contact with my reflection. I very nearly didn't recognize myself. She was absolutely gorgeous though it was clear while focusing on her burning eyes (glaring back at back at me with a vibrant, fiery passion that seemed to hide a great deal of pain) that her dress did not match her personality (her energy, her spunk, her unmissable passion.) I squinted my eyes to analyze her more carefully and as she did it back, I knew she was in my head, one step ahead of me. She knew she was gorgeous, she knew she was dangerously smart, she knew that the fire in her eyes was piercing my soul and she knew what it concealed. She knew.

Last Tuesday, February 1st, was the two year anniversary of the day I met Dennis. Matt, Kat and I had plans to go down to Georgetown to go shopping in the afternoon. It was a chilly, but nice day and my only sweatshirt was dirty so I went rummaging through my drawers to find a sweater. I have two though I hardly ever wear them. I reached down and grabbed a brown sweater and threw it on. In an instant I remembered why I hadn't worn the sweater in well over a year. I'd worn that shirt exactly two years prior, on the day I met Dennis. It was so innocent, that day...we talked all afternoon. Little did I know that only two short weeks later, we'd timidly share a first kiss that would be followed by dozens of other stages of sexual growth...we really were kids. I'd give anything to go back to that kind of innocence, anything. I mean, my first kiss with Danny, while nice, wasn't even close to my first kiss with Dennis, even though he couldn't kiss at the time (I was his first.) Even though Danny and I shared a first kiss that didn't stray beyond that, it wasn't a sweet, innocent moment. We weren't discovering anything new, even each other. I'd go back to my first kiss with Dennis in a second if I could, not to change anything, I'd keep it all, even what's happening now...I'd go back to that horrible time in my life for that innocence. Not in relation to Dennis, I want that innocence again...I was expecting it when Danny kissed me...I don't know if it's possible to get that back.

I've gone off topic (big surprise.) When I realized that I'd subconsciously chosen to wear that brown sweater for the first time in ages that day, I just stared at myself in the mirror. I watched as a ghost, an image of my likeness separated itself from my form. There she was, a girl wearing the same sweater as I only she wore it opposite khaki's while I stood casually in my jeans. She was a few pounds lighter than I and as I squinted to examine her, she seemed uneasy, nervous, almost scared. She had no idea why I was looking at her as I was. There were embers burning faintly behind the brown eyes she found plain. He pain, unhidden, that I saw in her eyes could have made the coldest grown man cry. And she didn't know. She was smart, she was pretty (though not a knockout like the girl I saw today-she couldn't be, she was nearly crippled by the pain she endured,) and while she knew it, she didn't believe it.

So, have you ever looked at yourself in the mirror and not recognized the person you saw? For that matter, have you ever really looked at yourself?



Dennis-on the off chance you still read this, I hope what you're going through right now works out as well as my similar experience did. Comments ()

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