Accepting Un-Pretty

I spent most of my childhood being teased mercilessly by my peers, both at school and at church.  I have always been the fat, freckle-faced, redheaded, unpopular kid.  I didn't play sports.  I didn't have any particularly enviable talents  I didn't come from a "rich" family.  I rarely ever had more than one or two "friends" at any given time.  It didn't take me long to understand that I have never fit into the mold of what common society considers to be physically beautiful.  I probably understood this fact by the time I had finished elementary school—although acceptance of this fact would come much, much later.

As I grew into adulthood, I learned that it didn't really matter that I'm not beautiful.  I'm smart, I'm funny, I'm passionate, and I'm a hard worker.  I have learned that I don't need a hundred "best" friends, and I'm honestly much happier with a smaller, closer circle of genuine friends.  I have learned that who I am is good enough, and that I'm worthy of love and friendship and respect.  I've learned that I don't need to be beautiful, and I've come to realize that I'm not sure I'd even want the pressure that would come attached to maintaining a beautiful me.

Working around middle schoolers, these past several years, has given me the opportunity to develop an entirely different perspective on being "un-pretty" by watching it unfold through the eyes of my students.  While it's not something I point out to them, I have students who do not fit into the "beautiful" category.  Some of them may never fit into that category, and there's really nothing that they can do about it.  While the "un-pretty" seems to afflict both male and female students, it is the girls I worry about the most.

The problem I see is this:

When a girl goes crying to her friends, parents, or teachers, telling them that she has been harassed or bullied by someone who said she was "ugly" or "fat" or some other such derogatory term, it is almost always handled wrongly.  The first reaction or these friends and parents and teachers is to comfort the girl—and rightly so—and then to say something like "Just ignore them.  You're beautiful no matter what they say."

September 11th: Fallen Heroes & Innocent Victims

What I am publishing here today is neither original nor unique.  We all know that there were nearly 3,000 people killed on September 11th, 2001.  It will be another one of those dates in history that people look back and can all very specifically say "I remember exactly where I was and what I was doing when....."

In several places today, I have seen people posting lists of people killed on that day.  There were firefighters, police officers, paramedics, Port Authority, airline passengers, civilians on the street, military personnel at the Pentagon, and thousands of businessmen and women and children all going about their normal workdays.  I would say that most every person in the nation was affected personally in less than the standard "six degrees of separation."

The sheer numbers of people are shocking and tragic. Here I have combined all the (reliable) lists I can find.   The list below contains 953 names, representing roughly one-third of the 9-11 related deaths.  As you scroll down the list, allow yourself to take in how very long the list actually is.  Let us not forget that, while this attack changed our country forever, many people were affected on a much deeper level because of the loss of someone they loved.