By Afam
By
now we’ve all heard of her. She is Lupita Nyongo. Her accent is
musical. She is stunning in a way that isn’t singular but in spite of
this manages to be the source of many a debate. The debate doesn’t go so
far as to discuss the alignment of her facial features or the stark
contrast between her white white teeth and her dark dark skin every time
she breaks into a smile. It often remains fixated on the idea that she
is too dark to be classed as beautiful or that her. But none of that
matters. She is stunning to me. The man that first said that beauty is
in the eye of the beholder wasn’t a fool. When I think of beauty,
sometimes I think of me. You see, I know me. I know my faults, and my
failings and all my weaknesses. I know my disgusting bits so thoroughly
that I do not see my redeeming qualities clearly. Some times I doubt
that they exist. This is me. I am sure that sometimes, it is you too.
By
now we’ve all heard of her. She is Lupita Nyongo. Her accent is
musical. She is stunning in a way that isn’t singular but in spite of
this manages to be the source of many a debate. The debate doesn’t go so
far as to discuss the alignment of her facial features or the stark
contrast between her white white teeth and her dark dark skin every time
she breaks into a smile. It often remains fixated on the idea that she
is too dark to be classed as beautiful or that her. But none of that
matters. She is stunning to me. The man that first said that beauty is
in the eye of the beholder wasn’t a fool. When I think of beauty,
sometimes I think of me. You see, I know me. I know my faults, and my
failings and all my weaknesses. I know my disgusting bits so thoroughly
that I do not see my redeeming qualities clearly. Some times I doubt
that they exist. This is me. I am sure that sometimes, it is you too.
The other day, I said to my brother
Gbaddy, “Gbaddy, I feel so monumentally stupid!” I was beating myself up
over the fact that I’d come out of a negotiation even worse off than I
was before it began. All I could see at the time was the stupid.
When I was seven, I climbed up to the
top of a shelf to retrieve my year book for a girl I thought I would
marry at the time. When I found it, I held unto it with both hands and
pulled. My seven year old weird brain did not understand that without
the book to tether me to the shelf, I would return to the ground in so
forceful a manner that the entire misadventure would leave me without my
two front teeth. I felt ugly, and stupid then. In my first year of high
school some senior called me ‘scissor tooth’ as an affectation. I
embraced it on the surface, but really, it was more diss than
compliment. My late aunt would call me handsome. She always said it like
an exclamation; like it was a breath of fresh air; like calling me
handsome gave her joy. I didn’t see it. 12 year old boys with no front
teeth, pot bellies of childhood, and malnourished arms and legs could
not be good looking.
I got braces, I straightened out my
overbite, and I got caps that masked the jagged edges of my childhood
gaff, but they covered nothing. They healed nothing. I could finally
smile with all my teeth, but nothing had changed. I was ugly to me. The
girls marvelled at my new smile courtesy of Schubbs and dollars, and the
expertise of Dr. Amy. I shifted the focus once reserved for loathing my
teeth to the pot belly of childhood that had remained with me past my
years of childhood. I did sit ups, maniacally, obsessively, reaching
ever higher. At first it was 30, then it was 100, and then it was 300. I
gained the abs, but my stomach didn’t grow any flatter. I had achieved
the impossible. I had gained a defined 6 pack over a very rotund
stomach.
I wasn’t particularly happier than I was
before I’d begun, but I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to feeling a
measure of contentment. I would at least get compliments for my 6 pack
even if it was over the stomach typically found on a 40 year old
suffering from abdominal obesity.
I’m 23 now. The pot belly is still
there, but it’s smaller than it was. I’m skinny enough that people can
see that I never actually had a pot belly. The illusion was the result
of my curved back and abnormally large rib cage that my father swears I
got from his father. My widow’s peak grows more lonely by the second and
I feel fat. Well not fat per say, but that pot belly seems to be making
a come back. If all of this had happened when I was 17, or 18, or even
19, I would have been distraught but now I’ve got an odd appreciation
for these things. They really don’t matter in the grand scheme of
things. If my smile is perfect but not soothing, or contagious then what
good is it?
All the wisdom my 23 summers have
afforded me, has led me to see that no one holds the blue print on
beauty. All that really matters is that you’re beautiful to you. You
need to see the best of you. Someone once told me, “if you do not love
you, how can you expect anyone else to?” I don’t believe that anymore. I
think it should be more like, if you do not love yourself, then how can
you expect to be deserving of the love that you receive?
I suppose this shows that the price of wisdom is youth, and that it does get better.
Photo Credit: Hakeem Salaam Photography
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Afam is the man-child behind the blog the ramblings of a madman. Follow him on twitter @Afam20
Afam is the man-child behind the blog the ramblings of a madman. Follow him on twitter @Afam20
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