But The Quest for Beauty is a Beast. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Broken Innocence She couldn't have been older than four years old, though a bit small for her age. The living room was sunny and she was lost in her own little world. Her clothes were strewn about her room, and she hopped around naked in a large trash bag, unaware that she had a physical body. Her baby brother coos in the background. He has become a cowboy, and she a lovely princess. Her beautiful black dress shines in the light, and rustles where she hops. She hops into the bathroom where her mother is getting ready and screeches, "Mommie, look at me! Look at my dress!" Mommie doesn't notice. She whines in exasperation, "I have such a fat belly! I need a diet." Suddenly the dress returns to a trashbag. The girl, for the first time, sees who she is, notices that she is, in fact, a girl that has the not so perfect body. She stares down at her stomach and says, "Mommie, I have a fat belly!" and bursts into tears. "No honey, you have a cute belly!" Mommie says. The girl goes off crying. She knows that this is a double standard, that she is ugly. She presses on her belly, slinks to the toilet, and shoves her fingers down her throat. Grandma had mentioned it before that models did it to keep themselves skinny. "Promise me you will never do that!" she pleaded. "I promise." said the little girl, who hated vomiting. Too late. Mommie never kept her promises to anyone. A promise didn't mean anything except, "Don't ask again!" The little girl sulked with her head in the toilet bowl and up came her hot dog. Ewwww! She would never do that again, she thought. Or would she?... 11:31 p.m. - 2003-01-28 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------- |
||||||