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This is part 2 of a post about the book About Face.
I said I would follow up with my story about "what I see in the mirror," but I've got to tell you- this was a rough one. I wrote two totally separate versions; one nice, one angry. I choose to post the nice one, with a few angry jabs stuffed in. Here goes;
Who is this freaky chick?*
Happy-Go-Lucky
I can't remember a time that I looked in the mirror and I did not like what I see.
Sure, there was the gangling teeth stage, the teenage zit phase (which has not ended by the way and I am almost 40 for cripes sake), and the post modeling days when I cruised around in a black baseball hat and baggy clothes in an effort to keep all eyes OFF of me so I didn't have to live up to everyone's beauty expectations.
But all in all, I've never wanted to change anything about myself.
I am well aware there are way more beautiful women in the world; those beaming with perfectly symmetrical faces, exotic expressions, and sex appeal leaking out of their pores...but I have never wanted to be someone else.
Ever.
My nose is kinda crooked, and its getting bigger with age. We joke my dad that he has a “bulb” at the end of his nose, just like his mother, and now I see mine growing slowly but surely. It makes me proud to know, a part of him is now part of me.
My facial structure is from my mom. I remember when she came to Paris with me and my agent took one look at her and said “I see where she gets her high cheekbones from!” My mom was grinning from ear to ear. We still joke about it, and when she brings it up kiddingly I say “yeah, yeah....its all because of you mom.”
My height and big feet are from my Grandma, the one that walked a bit hunched over, but held her head up high, and didn't take any shit. She lived in the ghetto of Milwaukee, the only white women among many black families, who accepted her as one of their own. She was a firecracker, independent as hell, as she walked the blocks to the bus daily, and never, ever got mugged (sure, they tried, but she held on to her pocketbook and told them to get lost). And the tough little punks ran from the little old lady, with a glare that could knock you sideways. I'd like to think I also got my spunk from her.
My features are now passed on to my children. A “mini-me” daughter and my blue-eyed-boy that is going to give me an ulcer when his hormones kick in. They both were lucky enough to inherit two very distinct features from my husband – dimples and flat feet, the true sign of a Blessington.
When I ask my parents what I was like as a child, they smile and say “you were happy-go-lucky.”
I love that saying, perhaps because I believe it fits me to this day, and now I see the same quality in my children which makes me so very proud.
What more could you ask for than to be happy-go-lucky? A free spirit, born to roam, totally immune to cultural expectations. Free to just be who you were meant to be without looking back, without questioning, and without the imaginary stress the masses carry from day to day.
Perhaps the best part of this quality is that one doesn't care much about how others
