I am beautiful.
Not in a supermodel way. Not in a guys-creepily-honking-at-me way. Not even in a people-stop-to-compliment-me way.
I am not hot. I am not sexy. But I am beautiful.
I am beautiful, in a 'me' way. I am beautifully me.
I am beautiful because of who I am. I am beautiful because of whose I am.
I am beautiful despite what American society, culture and media defines as beautiful.
I am beautiful when I am dressed to impress, I am beautiful when I'm in my sweats, I am beautiful when I have just crawled out of bed.
I am beautiful.
There has been so much in my Facebook newsfeed lately about women's rights to wear whatever they want and to do whatever they want with their bodies, about how fat can be sexy, about how the media does indeed oversexualize and objectify women. It's a lot. It's overwhelming and depressing.
Society, the media and capitalistic American has a lot invested in making me hate myself. And I won't lie, it has succeeded in the past. I starved myself in hopes that guys would objectify me. And they did. Not so much anymore.
My body's not perfect. I know that my weight is a problem -- my back pain would be lessened and my energy probably increased if I lost weight. But my bodily imperfections -- my scars, my moles, my curves, my teeth, the mysterious bruises I always seem to have, the occasional blemishes -- these are the things that make me who I am. I embody my history in these imperfections.
My teeth, with their pitted enamel, are a testimony to the numerous ear infections I had as a young child, so many that only the most potent antibodies were effective, so potent that they affected the enamel of my permanent teeth when they came in.
The slight curve on my right forearm, offering witness to the bad break when I was 8 and thought I could balance on a baseball bat.
My missing toenail, which never did grow back after I quite literally walked it off in Israel.
My worsening scoliosis due to three back injuries before I turned 25 (and far too many hours in the library now!)
The stretch marks on my stomach from gaining and losing weight over the years.
The scar on my leg from where I broke a fluorescent bulb working on my first science fair project in junior high.
The scar on my lip from where grandpa thought he could protect the TV from my little toddler fingers by placing a wooden crate in front of it. There is a matching bloody blankie in a box somewhere in my parents' house.
The scar on my hand from the first time our dog Buttons (grr), a rescue, bit me and thereby 'initiated' me into his family.
The scar right above my left hip bone, from where I tripped over my own feet running to first base playing church softball, a permanent reminder of my first boyfriend, of how his brother had to come help me off the field because he was too busy flirting with another girl to notice that I was injured and crying, of how he used me as a 'human shield' in his fights with his brother, pushing me in the middle so I would take the punches meant for him.
Society tells me these are imperfections, that my body is -- that I am -- somehow less worthy because it is scarred and bent and curved. But I am beautiful because I am scarred and bent and curved.
I am beautiful through it all, despite it all, because of it all. I have never stopped smiling, never stopped laughing, never stopped loving.
I am beautiful.
