I wasn’t always a cynic or an evil witch (as my husband calls me) for that matter. That comes with time. I use to be a shy, self conscious, insecure little girl. I still have my moments of self-doubt. I did, however, manage to work my way through six years of school (for a four-year degree). I’ve spent twenty years working at a career that isn’t what I thought it would be. I’ve raised two kids, and been married for twenty-four years to a man who might as well be my third. I guess that just changes your outlook on life forever.

When I was a teenager, I was smart, rather shy, and not pretty. The boys always sought out girls who were lighter skinned, with longer hair, popular, if not always bright. You know the type. If you weren’t particularly pretty, you at had to be “easy” or “one of the guys”. I was none of the above. Boys only sought me out if they needed the answers to last night’s homework.

I was also on the heavy (perhaps I should say voluptuous) side. I still am, but grown men are more apt to look for that than teenage boys are. I had worn a bra since third grade. By the time I hit junior high, my hips had exploded as well. My chest became the subject of conversation of many of my male classmates. They were in awe, but it didn’t make them ask me out on a date. Well, a few did. The boys who asked me to go with them were the ones who knew they didn’t stand a chance with the skinny, good-haired, high-yellow girls. The relationship usually lasted about a week or two. After a few telephone conversations, I would realize that I had absolutely nothing to talk to these boys about. I didn’t want to hear about the football game and they didn’t want to hear about the book I was reading.

What was bad only got worse when I went away to Edison Prep school starting my sophomore year. There, I was suddenly in a world of only 50 black students out of a thousand. I was one of about 20 black females fighting over the ten or so black males we thought were good-looking. All the while, the good-looking black males (usually athletes) were chasing the white girls. The white girls were using this time away from home to experiment with boys that their daddies would have never allowed them to see. The white boys, of course, were all chasing the blue-eyed blonds. So, where did that leave me? Straight out of luck, that’s where.